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Ralph Waldo Emerson 
Courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical Society 












"T^joJLkL V\|. % -T-i^o^J^crr^ 

EMERSONS 

REPRESENTATIVE 

MEN 


AND OTHER ESSAYS 


7 


EDITED BY 

EZRA KEMPTON MAXFIELD, Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR AND HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH 
WASHINGTON AND JEFFERSON COLLEGE 

ASSISTED BY 

JANE CROWE MAXFIELD, A.M. 

SOMETIME INSTRUCTOR IN ENGLISH, SIMMONS COLLEGE 



D. C. HEATH AND COMPANY 


BOSTON 

ATLANTA 


NEW YORK 
SAN FRANCISCO 
LONDON 


CHICAGO 

DALLAS 






HEATH’S GOLDEN KEY SERIES 

The following titles, among many others, are available 
or in 'preparation: 

POETRY 

Arnold’s sohrab and rustum and other poems 
browning’s shorter poems 
french’s recent poetry 

GUINPON AND O’KEEFE’S JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL 
POETRY 

Milton’s shorter poems 
scott’s lady of the lake 
Tennyson’s idylls of the king 

FICTION 

cooper’s LAST OF THE MOHICANS 
eliot’s silas marner 
eliot’s mill on the floss 
Hawthorne’s house of the seven gables 

TALES FROM HAWTHORNE 

dickens’s tale of two cities ( entire ) 

dickens’s tale of two cities {edited for rapid reading) 

scott’s ivanhoe 

SCOTT’S QUENTIN DURWARD 

WILLIAMS AND LIEBER’s PANORAMA OF THE SHORT 
STORY 

OTHER TITLES 

ADDISON AND STEELE’S SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY 
PAPERS 

Boswell’s life of Johnson {selections) 
burke’s on conciliation 

PHILLIPS AND GEISLER’s c GL;IMPSES INTO THE WORLD 

of science ; : 

lowell’s a certain condescension and democracy 
. {with other essays on international good and bad will) 
Macaulay’s Johnson 

FRENCH AND GODKIN’s OLD TESTAMENT NARRATIVES 

Shakespeare’s julius caesar 
Shakespeare’s midsummer night’s dream 

Copyright, 1929 

By D. C. Heath and Company v 
2 i 9 

Printed in the United States of America 

Oct a c, |p^ 

©CIA 14399 'U A 


. A\ 

\°\sa 

Co^cL PREFACE 

The text of these essays has been carefully collated with 
the best editions published soon after Emerson’s death, 
which undoubtedly represent the author’s own revisions. 
Wherever possible the original punctuation has been re¬ 
tained. Only in cases where more modern practice would 
better serve the original sense has a change been effected. 
The Notes, which for greater convenience to the student or 
reader are placed directly following each essay, are more 
comprehensive than usual with student editions of Emerson, 
yet are made as definite and concise as possible. The Sug¬ 
gestions for Study to be found in the Appendix do not insult 
the intelligence of the teacher by the intrusion of mere 
methods. Most teachers have their own ways of employing 
such material and would prefer to be unhampered. These 
helps are mainly in the nature of study questions, and deal 
primarily with content of each essay. The Bibliography has 
been restricted to the most useful books dealing with Emer¬ 
son and his background, such as are available in most good 
libraries. Magazine articles, of which there are too many to 
include, can be easily located by the aid of the various A. L. 
A. indexes in every library. 

It is hoped that this volume will prove of equal value to 
both high school and college classes in American literature. 

E. K. M. 


m 



CONTENTS 


PAGE 

Preface . iii 

Introduction . vii 

REPRESENTATIVE MEN 

I. Uses of Great Men . i 

II. Plato; or, The Philosopher. 25 

Plato; New Readings. 49 

III. Swedenborg; or, The Mystic . 63 

IV. Montaigne; or, The Sceptic.100 

V. Shakespere; or, The Poet.126 

VI. Napoleon; or The Man of the/World. . . 149 

VII. Goethe;/ or The Writer .174 

OTHER ESSAYS 

Self-Reliance . 195 

Compensation.225 

Manners . 248 

APPENDIX 

General Questions.273 

Questions .274 

Bibliography.280 


v 


















. 












































































INTRODUCTION 


Why We Study Emerson Today. Most young people of 
today know very little about the America of the early nine¬ 
teenth century. Accustomed as they are to hearing of our 
greatness as a nation and to seeing a land easily encompassed 
by rapid transportation, they have small appreciation of con¬ 
ditions as they were when Emerson was growing up. Nor can 
they realize the importance of Emerson in the development 
of our national consciousness. To them he is but a name 
found among our native authors; and sometimes, as when 
they are required to read his essays as a part of their school 
work, perhaps they would feel no regret if he had never been 
born. Yet the study of Emerson’s Essays is an important 
element in the education of every American youth, not only 
because they are regarded as great literature by the entire 
world, but because they express a spirit that is indigenous to 
America. . Emerson is not only a true embodiment of the 
spirit of independence but a leader who has done much to 
open our minds to freedom of thought. Yet he never led an 
army, nor ran for a political office, nor in any way exemplified 
the hero. A quiet and unassuming little man, he merely 
followed his inward convictions and expressed the truth as he 
felt it. His message awakened the minds of his countrymen 
from Maine to California. It shook churches out of a century- 
old lethargy and set people to forming literary societies and 
to reading books, for the betterment of their minds. Cer¬ 
tainly, if all this is so, every true American student should be 
glad to read this message for himself. 

The United States in 1800. In the opening years of the 
nineteenth century the United States hardly extended beyond 
the Mississippi River; yet so difficult was the means of travel, 
by stagecoach and canal boat, that the various sections of the 
country were almost as remote as Europe today. Further- 

vii 


Vlll 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


more, there was little national unity. New England was 
sparsely settled. It had no large towns, and its communities 
kept very much to themselves. Its residents were thought to 
be very proud of their ancestry and rather uncordial to 
strangers. This reputation for exclusiveness New Englanders 
have never entirely lived down. New York, while it still 
remembered proudly that its founders had been Dutch from 
Amsterdam, was already a melting pot of races from Europe. 
Pennsylvania, dominated still by Quaker aristocracy in the 
eastern part and by the Scotch-Irish in the west, was also 
cosmopolitan and wrapped up in its own affairs. The southern 
states, as much pure English as New England, wei;e Tory 
and unpuritanic in their traditions. Their social order, by 
which families lived on plantations maintained by slave labor, 
naturally tended to make them independent and undemo¬ 
cratic. 

The War of 1812. The Revolutionary War had united the 
colonies only in a patriotic sense, as against a common op¬ 
pressor, but had not brought them much nearer together in 
tastes. Industries and commerce were still handicapped by 
the unwillingness of Great Britain to recognize our rights upon 
the sea. In Emerson’s boyhood the battles between the 
British Guerriere and the American frigate Constitution , be¬ 
tween the Frolic and the Wasp, as well as the triumphs of 
Commander Perry on Lake Erie, were still being fought. In¬ 
deed, Emerson once told an audience in Boston about a certain 
day he remembered while attending the Boston Latin School, 
when the whole school had been dismissed by the principal so 
that the boys could help the militia build earthworks on 
Noddle’s Island, in the harbor, in preparation for an expected 
attack by the British, which did not after all materialize. 

Boston. Boston, according to the census of 1800, had a 
population of only 24,937 persons. By 1810 it had gained less 
than nine thousand. Subsequent growth was correspond¬ 
ingly small until the eighties and nineties, when manufactures 
and shipping had so increased as to make Boston one of the 
leading ports of the country. 

This older Boston still occupied the narrow peninsula of the 


INTRODUCTION 


ix 


original “ three mounts,” or Tremont, between the Charles 
River and the Harbor. The newer part of the city then, where 
most of the wealthy and aristocratic had built their homes, 
was between famous old Beacon Hill and the section east of 
the Common, now the very heart of the wholesale district. 
The historic Common was still a tract of unimproved ground 
used as a playground, a drilling field for the militia, and a 
pasturage for cows. That residents could keep cows, together 
with the fact that houses in the very heart of the city were 
provided with ample yards and orchards, proves the rural 
nature of this Boston of the early part of the nineteenth cen¬ 
tury. One of Emerson’s chores as a boy was to lead the 
family cow to and from the Common, night and morning, 
during his school days. On this walk he crossed many open 
spaces now traversed by numerous streets and packed with 
tall buildings — while beyond his home, on the side toward 
the harbor, masts of sailing vessels from distant ports threw 
their shadows over mudflats on which now stand Atlantic 
Avenue and the Elevated. 

Emerson’s Ancestors. Emerson’s first American ancestor 
had landed in Boston in 1634, one of many Puritan ministers 
who had grown dissatisfied with conditions in the church in 
the old world. He was the Reverend Peter Bulkeley, one of 
the founders of Concord, the little village where Ralph Waldo 
Emerson was to live during the greater part of his career. 
Later Peter Bulkeley accepted a call to the first church built 
in Cambridge. His son Edward succeeded him in this minis¬ 
try and was long remembered as a devoted pastor. It was 
Peter Bulkeley’s daughter Elizabeth who united the Bulkeleys 
with the Emersons in her marriage with the Reverend Joseph 
Emerson of Ipswich. 

Joseph Emerson’s father had settled at Ipswich in 1635, and 
had been succeeded by his son. The son of Joseph and Eliza¬ 
beth Emerson, named Edward, married Rebecca Waldo, a 
descendant of an early Protestant sect founded by an ancestor, 
known as the Waldensians. Their son, in turn, Joseph 
Emerson II, married Mary Moody, the daughter of Samuel 
Moody, a Maine clergyman. The result of this union, William 


X 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


Emerson I, married Phoebe, the daughter of the Reverend 
Bliss. Their son, William Emerson II, was the father of 
Ralph Waldo Emerson. He had been graduated from Har¬ 
vard with Phi Beta Kappa honors, had married Miss Ruth 
Haskins of Boston, and at the time of Ralph Waldo’s birth 
was settled as the pastor of the First Church of Boston, then 
Unitarian. 

The Reverend William Emerson, father of our essayist, had 
been a man of accomplishment. He had been not only a bril¬ 
liant preacher and conversationalist but the inspirer of an 
interest in art, music, and literature, leading to the founding 
of the Boston Athenaeum and such later institutions as the 
Lowell Institute, the Boston Public Library, and the Museum 
of Fine Arts. He had become a minister mainly because it 
had been his mother’s fondest hope to see him carry on the 
family tradition. He had been called from his first pastorate 
in the little town of Harvard, at more than twice his salary, 
and at the time of his death was earning what was then con¬ 
sidered a large income, $2500, with the rent of the parsonage 
and thirty cords of wood with which to heat it. 

He was thirty-six when his fifth son was born. In his diary 
for the date of May 25, 1803, he records, “ This day whilst 
I was at dinner at Governor Strong’s, my son Ralph 
Waldo was born.” 

He died in 1810 and was given a most impressive funeral 
by the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company of which 
he had been chaplain. In later years Ralph Waldo recalled the 
magnificent cortege of some sixty coaches and the line of uni¬ 
formed soldiers. To a boy of eight such a scene was bound 
to be impressive. 

Emerson as a Boy. Emerson was an odd sort of boy, and 
in this oddness we can see the shadow of the coming man. To 
begin with he was frail and very shy. At about the age of ten 
he is described by a contemporary as “ spiritual-looking,” and 
by another as “ absolutely faultless in his conduct,” courtly in 
his manners, and so cold in exterior as to appear incapable of 
warm feeling and affection, though we now know that this last 
was not strictly true. Now most boys are not always irre- 


INTRODUCTION 


xi 


proachable in their behavior, and although they sometimes ap¬ 
pear like saints in company, are regular savages in their play. 
They invariably have their enthusiasms, whatever their lack of 
opportunities, whether it is egg collecting, fishing, or swim¬ 
ming, if they are country-bred, or playing pirates and follow¬ 
ing a gang leader, in the city. Ralph Waldo, apparently, had 
neither talent nor inclination for play. It is possible that 
modern opportunities, such as afforded by school gymna¬ 
siums and Boy Scout camps would have developed some latent 
capacity for physical enjoyment, but none of these accesso¬ 
ries which the modern youth is privileged to enjoy then 
existed. Moreover, sports were not well regarded in Puritan 
Boston of the early nineteenth century. But Emerson did 
not even take advantage of the sports at hand, for he never 
owned a sled. Of course, the family was poor, sleds might 
be regarded as luxuries, and the father’s death may have 
made it necessary for the boy to help his mother in her brave 
struggle to provide a home and education for her boys, but 
notwithstanding it is probable that this boy would have 
amused himself in unusual ways if left to his own inclinations. 

What these amusements were we know in part and for the 
rest must resort to our imaginations, for regarding these in¬ 
timate matters Emerson the man had told us little, for he 
was never one to talk much about himself. If he cared to do 
so, he could have heard some interesting speeches by promi¬ 
nent orators, for it was the day when oratory flourished. He 
probably heard speeches in Faneuil Hall, at the court house, 
and very likely at town meeting, for serious-minded boys 
enjoy such things. He attended singing school once, but was 
told by the teacher that he had no voice. But one thing we 
do know, and that is that he spent a great deal of time in 
reading. And on occasions he tried to write poetry. Once he 
took a novel from the lending library, but never finished it, 
because his Aunt Mary reproved him for the sinfulness of 
spending six cents for such a luxury when his mother so badly 
needed the money. 

His Aunt Mary. This Aunt Mary was a very unusual sort 
of person and probably did much to influence the lives of the 


Xll 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


Emerson children. She had been the daughter of that 
William Emerson who had built the Old Manse at Concord, 
where she had been born. She was often an inmate of the 
Emerson home after her brother’s death and was of much 
assistance to Emerson’s mother. She was a vivacious lady 
of most unexpected ways of doing and saying things, devoted 
to poetry and heavy reading, but very pious, so pious in fact 
that she hourly awaited her death, though she lived to be 
very old. She frequently wore a burial gown in order that 
she might be ready for the summoning angel, and to remind 
herself of her mortality she slept in a bed built in the shape of 
a coffin. But she was far from being gloomy or sad, however; 
to the contrary her wit was known for miles around. She 
taught Ralph Waldo his first love for poetry and that interest 
in Plato that lasted throughout his life. You will note the 
importance he accords to Plato in the series of the Representa¬ 
tive Men. 

Emerson’s Mother. Emerson’s mother should not be for¬ 
gotten. She was a quiet woman, very devout, always serene 
in temper, and so self-possessed as to appear almost cold. 
We can thus understand from whom Ralph Waldo derived 
his disposition. Most women, accustomed to luxury and the 
prestige accorded minister’s families, finding themselves 
widowed with a family of five boys, all under eight, to rear 
and educate, would have fallen prey to despair; but not she. 
When the calamity of her husband’s untimely death came, she 
merely took it as the Lord’s will and proceeded at once to her 
appointed task of training her boys in the fear of the Lord. 
For several years the church allowed her a small pension and 
the use of the parsonage. But later she moved a little farther 
uptown and took in boarders. She thus not only educated 
her sons but lived to see at least two of them famous. 

The School Boy. At eight Ralph Waldo was attending the 
public grammar school, and a few years later he was able to 
enter the Boston Latin School, then located on School Street 
across the road from Old King’s Chapel. As a school-boy he 
was dressed in suits of blue nankeen, an inexpensive cotton 
cloth imported from China, usually worn by youths of his 


INTRODUCTION 


xm 


age. We fancy that the arms and legs of the growing boy 
often outstripped these garments, which were also often 
faded from much washing. Yet the strangest thing of all is 
that he never stood very high in his classes. 

In the fall of 1817 he entered Harvard College. He was 
then thirteen, tall for his years, and delicate. Slow in his 
movements and speech and shy in disposition, not making 
friends easily, he was not impressive. His poverty made it 
necessary for him to earn a part of his expenses, which he 
did by becoming errand boy for President Kirkland and by 
waiting on table at the commons. Later he did tutoring and 
some teaching as well during winter vacations. 

Little is told us about his college days, except a few meager 
accounts by his contemporaries, who had not paid him much 
attention, and by the scraps of his Journal which have been 
preserved. If you will take down Volume I of Emerson’s 
Journals , as they are now published, you will find some direct 
evidence of these college years, a little of what he was doing 
and much more of what he was thinking. Even then he was 
thinking lofty thoughts. There are accounts of his walks, his 
reading, and his activities in founding and contributing to a 
literary society. Most interesting of all is a reproduction of 
an original sketch of his room in Hollis Hall. 

As a student he did fairly well in languages, but he was, by 
his own account, at least, “ a hopeless dunce ” in mathematics. 
He read extensively of books not required by his instructors and 
dreamed fondly of becoming a poet. In his junior and senior 
years he surprised every one by taking two Bowdoin Prizes 
awarded for literary excellence and a Boylston Prize for ora¬ 
tory. He was also'given a commencement oration to deliver 
in his senior year, much to his disappointment, because he 
had aspired to be class poet. This function came to him 
ultimately, however, though without much honor, after it had 
been refused by several others. The oration he did badly, but 
the poem was accorded brilliant. He was graduated at the 
middle of his class, thus failing of election to Phi Beta Kappa. 
Years later, however, that society was to feel honored by in¬ 
viting him to deliver its annual address. 


xiv 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


Teaching School. The next few years are not very inspir¬ 
ing reading. After graduation he had not very definite plans 
for the future. He wanted to be a poet, which ambition was 
hardly practical enough to afford a livelihood. He also ex¬ 
pressed the desire to be a teacher of oratory, but received no 
offers. So he took the only job awaiting him, an assistantship 
in his brother William’s school for girls, in Boston. William 
was the eldest of the five Emerson boys. On him naturally 
had fallen the mantle of the Emerson tradition, to become a 
preacher. He was now earning the money for his divinity 
course by conducting this private school. But William was 
beginning to doubt his fitness for the ministry. He left Ralph 
Waldo in charge the following year and sailed for Germany 
for study. Here his doubts became convictions. He had 
even consulted the great poet Goethe in his perplexity and 
had received the good man’s advice to- return home and 
preach. Instead he had come home and studied law. 

His One and Only Pastorate. In the meanwhile the third 
brother, Edward, by all accounts the most promising of the 
family, after as brilliant a career at Harvard as Ralph Waldo’s 
had been mediocre, also decided to become a lawyer. The 
fourth brother, Bulkeley, now being a confirmed invalid,, 
could justify no ambitions, and the youngest brother, Charles, 
dying on a voyage south for his health, left the burden upon 
one seemingly unbrilliant to carry on the ministerial tradi¬ 
tion. Thus the choice of a profession was thrust upon Ralph 
Waldo. Today we may not understand why it should seem 
so necessary that at least one Emerson should be a preacher, 
but family pride was then strong in old New England. 

He was twenty-three when he entered the Harvard Divinity 
School. He was still frail in body, rather sickly, and even 
lacking in ambition. He soon received his license as a student 
preacher, so that he could support himself while in the school. 
But in 1826 his health and eyesight were so bad that he was 
obliged to stop work and go to Florida for the winter. He 
managed to complete his course ultimately, however, and in 
January 11, 1829, he was ordained as the assistant minister of 
the Second Church of Boston. Only t.wq months later, the 


INTRODUCTION 


xv 


pastor, Dr. Ware, was obliged to resign through failing 
health, and Emerson was given full charge of the congrega¬ 
tion. 

All went well for a time. For any ordinary soul this would 
have been the beginning of a final career, but Emerson’s real 
life was yet to begin. He performed the duties of pastor well 
and was acceptable to his congregation. In this period he 
married the woman of his choice, Miss Ellen Louise Tucker, 
of Boston, a talented and charming woman. In 1832, how¬ 
ever, three important events occurred: first, in January 
Mrs. Emerson died of what was then known as “ consump¬ 
tion second, his sudden convictions against administering 
the Lord’s Supper as a formal rite, followed by his resignation; 
third, his setting out on a sailing vessel for Europe to be gone 
nearly a year. Thus the year 1832 marks the date of Emer¬ 
son’s rebirth, as a thinker and a citizen of the world. 

In Europe Emerson had a most satisfying experience, visit¬ 
ing Italy, France, and England, broadening his mind and 
meeting many new friends. Among other notable persons he 
visited Landor, Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Carlyle. He 
returned the following year and took up his residence at Con¬ 
cord, with his mother as housekeeper. 

Concord. Concord more than any other spot in America 
is reminiscent of Emerson. It lies some twenty miles inland 
from Boston in a northwesterly direction. The village has 
grown very little since Emerson’s day, having now a popula¬ 
tion of only less than eight thousand souls, and most of the 
important buildings then standing still remain. Most of the 
points of interest there are historical as well as literary. 
There are many Revolutionary landmarks, as well as those 
which savor of the glorious days when the Lyceum flourished. 
In both of these periods both Bulkeleys and Emersons had 
their part. It had been a Bulkeley that had helped found 
the town as well as the church. It was an Emerson, the 
grandfather of our essayist, who had built the Old Manse 
close by the scene of the famous fight at the North Bridge, 
across the Musketaquid. This grandfather had not only 
witnessed this fight whose shot, as his grandson said, was 


XVI 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


11 heard ’round the world,” but had died of a fever con¬ 
tracted in his country’s service while chaplain of the Conti¬ 
nental Army, October 20, 1776. 

The Old Manse was later occupied by the Reverend Ezra 
Ripley, who married Emerson’s grandmother; then by 
Emerson himself on his return from abroad in 1834; and still 
later by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Hawthorne’s Mosses of an 
Old Manse , written in the old study where many ministers 
have prepared their sermons and where Emerson had written 
Nature , helps to make the old house a hallowed spot. The 
Wright Tavern also brings back Revolutionary days, as does 
the museum of the Concord Antiquarian Society. Then there 
is the Thoreau house, where Emerson was a frequent visitor, 
the former home of the pencil-maker naturalist who attracted 
much attention as the hermit of Walden Pond. The Emerson 
mansion remains today as its former owner left it, but it is 
not, unfortunately, the same building in which he spent most 
of his life, for that was burned in 1872. Not far away from 
the mansion still stands the Alcott house, where lived another 
transcendentalist, the strange author of Orphic Sayings, 
Bronson Alcott, with his interesting family. Here his daugh¬ 
ter Louisa Alcott wrote Little Women, which is practically a 
history of the family life there. And next door, separated by 
a grove from the Alcott’s, is Wayside, the last home of Haw¬ 
thorne. 

Besides these interesting shrines one may discover tablets 
which apprise one of other facts. Thus we learn that the Con¬ 
tinental Congress was assembled in Concord in 1774 and that 
Harvard College once held classes here during the Revolution, 
in I775 -I 776, to permit the occupation of its buildings in 
Cambridge by the Continental troops. Also, a visit to the 
two historic old cemeteries will acquaint us with the names of 
many worthies which this remarkable village has produced, 
including of course the group we have already mentioned. 

Emerson’s Attitude. Up to this time Emerson appears to 
have had very few real friends, for he was never one to go out 
of his way to acquire them. Yet we must not get a wrong 
impression, for he also had no enemies. It was simply that 


INTRODUCTION 


xvii 


his nature kept the world always at a distance. One who knew 
him at all must make the advances, and in this early period, 
it must be confessed, he had shown the world very little of 
himself that was worth cultivating very deeply. To all alike 
he was affable, polite, and kind, and while never unduly self- 
assertive, he was nevertheless self-confident. Indeed it would 
appear that friends were not very essential to his happiness. 
And the reason may not be hard to find: Emerson was a 
thoroughbred of a stock that had been acquiring those very 
traits for generations, for breeding counts in men as well as in 
animals. His ancestors had been not only Puritans but 
clergymen, mainly, and he had inherited the brain paths of 
both. The Puritan for generations had trained himself in 
self-control, had suppressed the desire for worldly pleasures, 
and lived within himself, believing that salvation was purely 
a matter for each individual to settle with his God. Emerson 
thus shows the effect of this repression, quite as many other 
New Englanders have done. As for the Puritan clergy¬ 
man, he not only had believed himself, but was regarded by 
his congregation, to be a man apart, a man of God and a 
saint, who could not mingle indiscriminately with men of 
clay. The Puritan minister must have been a very lonesome 
man. Emerson all his life, though he had no regular pulpit, 
was instinctively the preacher. Unbend as he would, he 
could not let men come too close. He was always to some 
degree the high priest among men. 

In the boy these traits had been very manifest. Naturally 
enough any boy who did not take part in sports would not be 
popular in any generation. Not only could we infer from this 
fact Emerson’s probable unpopularity, but we know that his 
Uncle Ripley once reproved him for not getting on with his 
mates. And in college the situation was not much improved, 
though few persons admit that they actually disliked him. 
Some thought him merely stupid and others a bore. He al¬ 
ways read heavy treatises as his contribution to the literary 
club meetings, which are recorded by the secretary without 
enthusiasm. In his freshman year he had an attractive boy 
from the south as a roommate, named Gourdin, who made so 


XV111 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


little impression upon him that he has nothing to say about 
him in his diary. Yet another boy whom he did not even 
try to know, named Martin Gay, he wrote of frequently in 
almost affectionate terms and wrote a poem about, often 
stalking him from afar as he went about town. Certainly a 
strange lad! 

Of course, after one makes a success of life and becomes fa¬ 
mous, one may have as many friends as one chooses. In 
later years Emerson had no lack of friends, and even college 
mates who had previously ignored him then tried to make 
amends by softening their recollections. To all he gave the 
same gracious smile, the same friendly conversation, but no 
more of his inward self than formerly. In spite of his affabil¬ 
ity, he was always a little cold. 

Return to Concord and Second Marriage. After his return 
to Concord he seems for a time to have had no very definite 
plans. He preached occasionally and gradually came to be 
in demand as a lecturer. In 1834 he was honored in being 
asked to deliver the annual poem of the Phi Beta Kappa 
Society at Cambridge. In 1835 he married Miss Lidia Jack- 
son, of Plymouth, bought an old house near the river, where 
he was to live the remainder of his days, and set up house¬ 
keeping. At this time he was only beginning to be known. 

In 1836 the Transcendental Club was formed, which proved 
the beginning of Emerson’s greatest influence. It was never 
a formally organized group of people which constituted this 
little circle. At least, Emerson has denied that it was. Nor 
was it called by any one name. Sometimes it was spoken of as 
the “ Symposium,” and again as the “ Hedge Club,” because it 
usually met on days when its most distant member, the 
Reverend F. H. Hedge from Maine, could be present. Its 
founding all came about very naturally. In the fall of 1836 
when Emerson and other Unitarian clergymen were attending 
the bicentennial celebration of Harvard College, several of 
them were of the opinion that the viewpoint of the churches 
was far too narrow; so they resolved to do something about 
it. They met in Willard’s Hotel, four men, F. H. Hedge, 
George Ripley, George Putnam, and Emerson. A few days 


INTRODUCTION 


xix 


later with additional friends they held a conference at Con¬ 
cord at Ripley’s home. By the next meeting, at Emerson’s 
house, the Symposium was in full operation. 

Out of this grew two projects of note: the printing of an 
official magazine known as the Dial and the establishment of 
that famous communistic experiment at Brook Farm, where 
many of their ideas for social betterment were put to the 
acid test. This ideal community, like all such schemes, failed 
not because the idea was not wholesome, but because it did 
not pay. It is rather amusing to note that Emerson, while he 
was a frequent visitor to the farm and regarded as its inspira¬ 
tion, was too shrewd a Yankee to invest any money in it. 

Emerson’s Friends. Of the many persons drawn together 
by these Transcendental ideas, all of whom may be said to 
be Emerson’s friends, the following are most remembered: 
Margaret Fuller (later Marchioness Ossoli), Reverend George 
Ripley, Dr. Convers Francis, Reverend Theodore Parker, 
Dr. F. H. Hedge, Reverend James Freeman Clarke, Reverend 
O. A. Bronson, Reverend William H. Channing, George W. 
Curtis, Bronson Alcott, Charles K. Newcomb, Henry Tho- 
reau, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. There are several books 
dealing with the Transcendental Movement, but one of the 
most interesting and instructive is Lindsay Swift’s Brook 
Farm (Macmillan, 1900). It gives a fairly full account of all 
of these. 

Among the Transcendentalists there were at least three 
with whom Emerson was most intimate: Thoreau, Alcott, and 
Miss Fuller. With Thoreau especially he seemed to be most 
human. We cannot take the time here to discuss the eccen¬ 
tricities of this man. He was a descendant of colonists from 
the Isle of Jersey, off the French coast, a little land which 
enjoys simple living even today and disclaims the right of 
either the French or the British government to rule it. Tho¬ 
reau, evidently inheriting this independence, tried to be free 
of modern social obligations. Thus he had performed his 
experiment of living in a hut at Walden Pond and writing 
his Book, Walden /telling the world how little it needed to 
obtain happiness. He was a pencil-maker by trade, and when 


XX 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


he had perfected his pencil, refused to sell his secret to a 
New York manufacturer, because he did not believe in 
commercialism. Emerson used to pay his taxes, it is said, 
because Thoreau preferred to go to jail than thus help a na¬ 
tion that permitted negro slavery. Once Emerson did find 
him in jail, and came over at once to bail him out. “ Henry, 
why are you here? ” Emerson is reported to have said. 
“ Waldo, why are you not here?” was Thoreau’s retort. Yet 
he did not object at being released. Perhaps Thoreau was 
more of a Yankee than he pretended to be. 

Bronson Alcott to most persons was a bore. He kept a 
school at his house, Fruitlands, where he trained young people 
in his special theories. In many ways he seems to have 
been a crank, though a kindly soul. Some people accuse him 
of stealing Emerson’s thunder in his Orphic Sayings. At any 
rate, Emerson liked him. Besides, we can love him for his 
daughter Louisa’s sake, for after all she is a product of his 
training. In her popular Little Women she describes the life 
of the family at Fruitlands. 

Margaret Fuller was one of the most talented of the Tran¬ 
scendental group, but she had been reared too puritanically, 
with too great a sense of her own importance. To many 
people she was intolerable, though all accorded her a brilliant 
mind. She and Emerson were thrown much together by 
common interests. Both edited the Dial at different times. 

Transcendentalism. Of Transcendentalism itself we shall 
not attempt to say very much. To define it would tax the re¬ 
sources of a seer. What it is you may gather from Emerson’s 
own works, for all his essays, as well as most of his verse, ex¬ 
press this way of thinking. You will gather that it is spiritual 
and intellectual, rather than material, thinking. It is an 
appeal to our better selves, to liberate our minds from gross, 
bread-and-butter living and from petty local interests, to 
more universal spheres. And it hits us today even harder 
than it hit our fathers and grandfathers, for we are living in 
an age when money and the things it will buy have more con¬ 
cern with us than intellectual and spiritual matters. To 
■ Emerson and his group the movement meant revolt from 


INTRODUCTION 


xxi 


conventional thinking, particularly as exemplified in the 
Unitarian Church. Thus is it ever with the world. One 
generation fights for its convictions, and the next is content 
to accept their views as final without thinking at all. The 
views which Emerson regarded narrow were, say, in 1805, 
decidedly radical. And so, in fact, had the opinions been of 
the Puritans in the beginning. Our first ancestors who 
braved the dangers of the sea to accept even greater danger 
in the American wilderness had done so because they had 
fresh, advanced views that the old-world church was not 
ready to accept. The Unitarians had staged their revolt 
when Puritanism had become mere dogma, and so the Tran- 
scendentalists were once more asking for the right to think and 
worship as they pleased. Only the Transcendental Move¬ 
ment was not confined solely to religious matters. The word 
itself means simply, “ something beyond that is, a nature 
in man which is capable of responding to higher things, as 
represented by nature, art, religion, than can be measured 
by material standards or probed by the intellect. Emerson’s 
immediate predecessors in these ideas were such men as the 
English poets Coleridge and Wordsworth, the essayist Carlyle, 
and the German poet Goethe. Indirectly many philosophers, 
from Plato down to modern German thinkers, were responsible. 
Perhaps you will now understand why Emerson makes so 
many references to men of this type. 

Emerson’s Last Days. Of Emerson’s life there remains 
little more to be told. Twice more he went abroad, the second 
time as a reward for his popularity, while his house, which 
had burned in 1872, was being restored. Before he died he had 
appeared on lecture platforms in nearly all parts of the country, 
and his books were read everywhere. He died quietly and 
serenely, April 27, 1882, of pneumonia. In his last days his 
memory had partially failed him, but he was intelligent to the 
end. Thus one day when he could not think of the word 
“umbrella,” he described it as something which people carry 
away. At the poet Longfellow’s funeral he remarked, “ That 
gentleman was a sweet, beautiful soul, but I have entirely 
forgotten his name.” 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

Emerson’s Works. There have been numerous editions of 
Emerson’s works since his death, many of which are badly 
edited and imperfect. The student should beware of any 
Emerson text which is not published by a reputable firm with 
the name of its editor on the title page. The only complete 
authentic edition is that published by Houghton Mifflin 
Company of Boston. The editions in their first printing are 
as follows: 

1836, Nature, an Essay 

1837, the famous Concord Hymn, celebrating the Battle at 

the North Bridge 

1841, Essays, First Series, including the essays Self-Re¬ 
liance and Compensation 

1844, Essays, Second Series, including the essay Manners 

1847, Poems 

1850, Representative Men, based on the lectures given in 
England during 1847-1848 

1856, English Traits 

i860, The Conduct of Life 

1867, May-Day and Other Pieces (Verse) 

1870, Society and Solitude 

1909-14, Emerson's Journals , edited by Emerson’s son and 
grandson, Edward Waldo Emerson and Waldo 
Emerson Forbes 

Emerson’s Style. As a stylist Emerson was by no means 
a perfect example for English writers of today. This is partly 
accounted for by the differences in our standards and partly 
by virtue of his own temperament. Style, after all, is more a 
matter of temperament than anything else. Geniuses cannot 
be expected to conform to convention, and Emerson was 
inherently a nonconformist. It is your colorless individual 
who writes like a copybook, who wears the latest style in 
clothes in the common manner, who is content when he is 
grammatically and rhetorically correct. Language is after all 
made for man and not man for language. The late Wendell 
Phillips’ famous remark to the young purist who detected a 
flaw in his diction comes to our mind: “ Young man, when 
the English language gets in,my way, it doesn’t stand a 


INTRODUCTION xxiii 

chance.” We must not be too critical of these smaller mat¬ 
ters, lest we defeat the purposes which language was intended 
to serve. Meticulousness may be necessary to the small 
man; freedom may be allowed the great one. Emerson was 
big enough to make his own standards. If we find him little 
unified in many of his paragraph structures, and less careful 
in the joining of his thought than modern style demands, let 
us look to the habits of the man. Perhaps such methods 
best express his personality, best serve his immediate aims. 
In other respects he may be superior. As Emerson himself 
explains in one of the essays in this collection, “ a certain 
compensation balances every gift and every defect.” 

What is this man behind the style? Let us look at him for 
a moment as his contemporaries knew him. 

We are told that he was a man of exceeding dignity and 
serenity of temper. He never moved rapidly, never did any¬ 
thing hurriedly; he always spoke deliberately and never lost 
his temper. Undoubtedly he likewise thought very slowly. 
This man lived at peace with the world and was beloved by 
his family, his neighbors and townspeople, and by his audi¬ 
ences. Everywhere he went he was treated with respect. 

Yet he had the courage of his convictions and refused to do 
or say anything that was contrary to his own conscience. 
He sacrificed his career as a minister when he could easily 
have satisfied his congregation by an outward conformity 
alone. He startled his audience in his famous Phi Beta 
Kappa address in Cambridge, where a lesser man would not 
have felt the need. He saw life clearly and faced it frankly. 

He was not what the world is pleased to call a practical 
man; that is, he was not a materialist. Possibly he was too 
visionary. He had a poet’s mind, which may account for 
everything. He was a dreamer, sharing the spirit of mystic 
philosophers. He was impervious to mathematical reasoning. 
He never took the pains to be accurate in statistics. He would 
quote from memory rather than go back to his source. Some¬ 
times he forgot to give credit for a borrowed line which he 
places in quotation marks. Yet there is no mistaking the 
value of his message. 


XXIV 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


His manner of writing is also instructive. He seldom, if 
ever, sat down to continuous composition. His way was to 
catch stray thoughts as they alighted in his mind. Thus he 
kept a notebook in his pocket, and on walks or at gatherings, 
when reading or at ease, whenever a thought came to his 
mind, he would record it by itself. In the course of many 
weeks, on the eve of an impending lecture, he wx>uld bring 
together these isolated notes, adding whatever amplification 
seemed suitable, and thus would evolve another discourse. 
These talks were all carefully revised, however, before 
publication, and so thus received additional observations 
from the notebook. 

Emerson’s style, then, is like the man: calm, serene, dis¬ 
passionate, individual, and somewhat dogmatic; often more 
romantic than scientific. His method of composition and the 
oral purpose for which his essays were originally planned give 
him a positiveness that we do not find in most literary com¬ 
positions. He was thus master of the epigrammatic style, 
that which delights in philosophic truths based on concrete 
imagery, which is calculated to keep an audience at attention. 
The many pauses, the overuse of words in series, the trick of 
balancing one idea over against another, the many short sen¬ 
tences ; all these and many more proclaim the master speaker. 
Could we hear these essays intoned by the rich voice of their 
author, we should accord them an even greater reputation 
than they have today. But the mature reader, whether he 
believe with the author or not, is invariably stimulated. 
That is why we regard Emerson so highly. 

E. K. Maxfield 

Washington, Pennsylvania 
May 25, 1929 


REPRESEN TATIVE MEN 


USES OF GREAT MEN 

TT is natural to believe in great men. If the companions of 
A our childhood should turn out to be heroes, and their 
condition regal, it would not surprise us. All mythology 
opens with demigods, and the circumstance is high and poetic; 
that is, their genius is paramount. In the legends of the 
Gautama, 1 the first men ate the earth and found it deliciously 
sweet. 

Nature seems to exist for the excellent. The world is up¬ 
held by the veracity of good men: they make the earth 
wholesome. They who lived with them found life glad and 
nutritious. Life is sweet and tolerable only in our belief in 
such society; and, actually or ideally, we manage to live with 
superiors. We call our children and our lands by their names. 
Their names are wrought into the verbs of language, their 
works and effigies are in our houses, and every circumstance 
of the day recalls an anecdote of them. 

The search after the great man is the dream of youth and the 
most serious occupation of manhood. We travel into foreign 
parts to find his works, — if possible, to get a glimpse of him. 
But we are put off with fortune instead. You say, the English 
are practical; the Germans are hospitable; in Valencia 2 
the climate is delicious; and in the hills of the Sacramento 3 
there is gold for the gathering. Yes, but I do not travel to 
find comfortable, rich, and hospitable people, or clear sky, or 
ingots that cost too much. But if there were any magnet that 
would point to the countries and houses where are the persons 

I 


2 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


who are intrinsically rich and powerful, I would sell all and 
buy it, and put myself on the road today. 

The race goes with us on their credit. The knowledge that 
in the city is a man who invented the railroad, raises the credit 
of all the citizens. But enormous populations, if they be 
beggars, are disgusting, like moving cheese, like hills of ants 
or of fleas, — the more, the worse. 

Our religion is the love and cherishing of these patrons. 
The gods of fable are the shining moments of great men. We 
run all our vessels into one mould. Our colossal theologies of 
Judaism, Christism, Buddhism, Mahometism, are the nec¬ 
essary and structural action of the human mind. The stu¬ 
dent of history is like a man going into a warehouse to buy 
cloths or carpets. He fancies he has a new article. If he go 
to the factory, he shall find that his new stuff still repeats the 
scrolls and rosettes which are found on the interior walls of 
the pyramids of Thebes. 4 Our theism is the purification of 
the human mind. Man can paint, or make, or think, 
nothing but man. He believes that the great material 
elements had their origin from his thought. And our philoso¬ 
phy finds one essence collected or distributed. 

If now we proceed to inquire into the kinds of service we 
derive from others, let us be warned of the danger of modern 
studies, and begin low enough. We must not contend against 
love, or deny the substantial existence of other people. I 
know not what would happen to us. We have social strengths. 
Our affection towards others creates a sort of vantage or 
purchase which nothing wi]l supply. I can do that by another 
which I cannot do alone, [j^can say to you what I cannot first 
say to myself. Other men are lenses through which we read 
our own minds^ Each man seeks those of different quality 
from his own, and such as are good of their kind; that is, 
he seeks other men, and the otherest . 5 The stronger the nature, 
the more it is reactive. Let us have the quality pure. A 
little genius let us leave alone. A main difference betwixt 


3 


USES OF GREAT MEN 

men is, whether they attend their own affair or not. Man is 
that noble endogenous 6 plant which grows, like the palm, 
from within outward. His own affair, though impossible to 
others, he can open with celerity and in sport. It is easy to 
sugar to be sweet and to nitre to be salt. We take a great deal 
of pains to waylay and entrap that which of itself will fall into 
our hands. I count him a great man who inhabits a higher 
sphere of thought, into which other men rise with labor and 
difficulty; he has but to open his eyes to see things in a true 
light and in large relations, whilst they must make painful 
corrections and keep a vigilant eve on many sources of error. 
His service to us is of like sort. \It costs a beautiful person no 
exertion to paint her image on our eyes; yet how splendid 
is that benefit! It costs no more for a wise soul to convey his 
quality to other men. And every one can do his best thing 
easiest. “ Peu de moyens , beaucoup d’effet” 7 He is great 
who is what he is from nature, and who never reminds us of 
others.jj 

But he must be related to us, and our life receive from him 
some promise of explanation. I cannot tell what I would 
know; but I have observed there are persons who, in their 
character and actions, answer questions which I have not 
skill to put. One man answers some question which none 
of his contemporaries put, and is isolated. The past and 
passing religions and philosophies answer some other question. 
Certain men affect us as rich possibilities, but helpless to 
themselves and to their times, — the sport perhaps of some 
instinct that rules in the air; — they do not speak to our want. 
But the great are near; we know them at sight. They satisfy 
expectation and fall into place. What is good is effective, 
generative; makes for itself room, food, and allies. A sound 
apple produces seed, — a hybrid 8 does not. Is a man in his 
place, he is constructive, fertile, magnetic, inundating armies 
with his purpose, which is thus executed. The river makes 
its own shores, and each legitimate idea makes its own chan- 


4 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


nels and welcome, — harvests for food, institutions for ex¬ 
pression, weapons to fight with, and disciples to explain it. 
The true artist has the planet for his pedestal; the adventurer, 
after years of strife, has nothing broader than his own shoes. 

Our common discourse respects two kinds of use or service 
from superior men. Direct giving is agreeable to the early 
belief of men; direct giving of material or metaphysical aid, 
as of health, eternal youth, fine senses, arts of healing, mag¬ 
ical power, and prophecy. The boy believes there is a teacher 
who can sell him wisdom. Churches believe in imputed merit. 
But, in strictness, we are not much cognizant of direct serving. 
Man is endogenous, and education is his unfolding. The aid 
we have from others is mechanical compared with the dis¬ 
coveries of nature in us. What is thus learned is delightful 
in the doing, and the effect remains. Right ethics are central 
and go from the soul outward. Gift is contrary to the law of 
the universe. Serving others is serving us. I must absolve 
me to myself. “Mind thy affair,” says the spirit: — “cox¬ 
comb, 9 would you meddle with the skies, or with other 
people?” Indirect service is left. Men have a pictorial 
or representative quality, and serve us in the intellect. 
Behmen 10 and Swedenborg 11 saw that things were representa¬ 
tive. Men are also representative; first, of things, and 
secondly, of ideas. 

As plants convert the minerals into food for animals, so 
each man converts some raw material in nature to human 
use. The inventors of fire, electricity, magnetism, iron, 
lead, glass, linen, silk, cotton; the makers of tools; the in¬ 
ventor of decimal notation; the geometer; the engineer; 
the musician, — severally make an easy way for all, through 
unknown and impossible confusions. Each man is by secret 
liking connected with some district of nature, whose agent 
and interpreter he is; as Linnaeus, 12 of plants; Huber, 13 of 
bees; Fries, 14 of lichens; Van Mons, 15 of pears; .Dalton, 16 of 
atomic forms; Euclid, 17 of lines; Newton, 18 of fluxions. 19 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


5 


A man is a centre for nature, running out threads of relation 
through every thing, fluid and solid, material and elemental. 
The earth rolls; every clod and stone comes to the meridian: 
so every organ, function, acid, crystal, grain of dust, has its 
relation to the brain. It waits long, but its turn comes. 
Each plant has its parasite, and each created thing its lover 
and poet. Justice has already been done to steam, to iron, 
to wood, to coal, to loadstone, to iodine, to corn, and cotton; 
but how few materials are yet used by our arts! The mass of 
creatures and of qualities are still hid and expectant. It 
would seem as if each waited, like the enchanted princess in 
fairy tales, for a destined human deliverer. Each must be 
disenchanted and walk forth to the day in human shape. 
In the history of discovery, the ripe and latent truth seems to 
have fashioned a brain for itself. A magnet must be made 
man in some Gilbert, 20 or Swedenborg, or CErsted, 21 before the 
general mind can come to entertain its powers. 

If we limit ourselves to the first advantages, a sober grace 
adheres to the mineral and botanic kingdoms, which, in the 
highest moments, comes up as the charm of nature, — the 
glitter of the spar, the sureness of affinity, the veracity of 
angles. Light and darkness, heat and cold, hunger and food, 
sweet and sour, solid, liquid and gas, circle us round in a 
wreath of pleasures, and, by their agreeable quarrel, beguile 
the day of life. The eye repeats every day the first eulogy 
on things, — “He saw that they were good.” We know 
where to find them; and these performers are relished all the 
more, after a little experience of the pretending races. We are 
entitled also to higher advantages. Something is wanting to 
science until it has been humanized. The table of logarithms 
is one thing, and its vital play in botany, music, optics, and 
architecture, another. There are advancements to numbers, 
anatomy, architecture, astronomy, little suspected at first, 
when, by union with intellect and will, they ascend into the 
life and reappear in conversation, character, and politics. 


6 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


But this comes later. We speak now only of our acquaint¬ 
ance with them in their own sphere and the way in which they 
seem to fascinate and draw to them some ggjoius who occupies 
himself with one thing, all his life long. 'CThe possibility of 
interpretation lies in the identity of the observer with the 
observed. Each material thing has its celestial side; has its 
translation, through humanity, into the spiritual and neces¬ 
sary sphere where it plays a part as indestructible as any 
other. And to these, their ends, all things continually ascen d.J 
The gases gather to the solid firmament: the chemic lump 
arrives at the plant, and grows; arrives at the quadruped, and 
walks; arrives at the man, and thinks. But also the constitu¬ 
ency determines the vote of the representative. He is not 
only representative, but participant. Like can only be known 
by like. The reason why he knows about them is that he is 
of them; he has just come out of nature, or from being a part 
of that thing. Animated chlorine knows of chlorine, and in¬ 
carnate zinc, of zinc. Their quality makes his career; and 
he can variously publish their virtues, because they compose 
him. Man, made of the dust of the world, does not forget 
his origin; and all that is yet inanimate will one day speak 
and reason. Unpublished nature will have its whole secret 
told. Shall we say that quartz mountains will pulverize into 
innumerable Werners, 22 Von Buchs, 23 and Beaumonts, 24 and 
the laboratory of the atmosphere holds in solution I know 
not what Berzeliuses 25 and Davys? 26 

Thus we sit by the fire and take hold on the poles of the 
earth. This quasi 27 omnipresence supplies the imbecility of 
our condition. In one of those celestial days when heaven 
and earth meet and adorn each other, it seems a poverty that 
we can only spend it once: we wish for a thousand heads, a 
thousand bodies, that we might celebrate its immense beauty 
in many ways and places. Is this fancy? Well, in good faith, 
we are multiplied by our proxies. How easily we adopt their 
labors! Every ship that comes to America got its chart 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


7 


from Columbus. Every novel is a debtor to Homer. Every 
carpenter who shaves with a fore-plane borrows the genius 
of a forgotten inventor. Life is girt all round with a zodiac 
of sciences, the contributions of men who have perished to 
add their point of light to our sky. Engineer, broker, jurist, 
physician, moralist, theologian, and every man, inasmuch as 
he has any science, — is a definer and map-maker of the 
latitudes and longitudes of our condition. These road- 
makers on every hand enrich us. We must extend the area 
of life and multiply our relations. We are as much gainers by 
finding a new property in the old earth as by acquiring a new 
planet. 

We are too passive in the reception of these material or 
semi-material aids. We must not be sacks and stomachs. 
To ascend one step, — we are better served through our sym¬ 
pathy. Activity is contagious. Looking where others look, 
and conversing with the same things, we catch the charm 
which lured them. Napoleon 28 said, “You must not fight too 
often with one enemy, or you will teach him all your art of 
war.” Talk much with any man of vigorous mind, and we 
acquire very fast the habit of looking at things in the same 
light, and on each occurrence we anticipate his thought. 

Men are helpful through the intellect and the affections. 
Other help I find a false appearance. If you affect to give 
me bread and fire, I perceive that I pay for it the full price, 
and at last it leaves me as it found me, neither better nor 
worse: but all mental and moral force is a positive good. It 
goes out from you, whether you will or not, and profits me 
whom you never thought of. I cannot even hear of personal 
vigor of any kind, great power of performance, without fresh 
resolution. We are emulous of all that man can do. Cecil’s 29 
saying of Sir Walter Raleigh, 30 “I know that he can toil 
terribly,” is an electric touch. So are Clarendon’s 31 portraits, 
— of Hampden, 32 “who was of an industry and vigilance 
not to be tired out or wearied by the most laborious, and of 


8 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


parts not to be imposed on by the most subtle and sharp, and 
of a personal courage equal to his best parts; ” — of Falk¬ 
land, 33 “who was so severe an adorer of truth, that he could 
as easily have given himself leave to steal, as to dissemble.” 
We cannot read Plutarch 34 without a tingling of the blood; 
and I accept the saying of the Chinese Mencius: 35 “A sage 
is the instructor of a hundred ages. When the manners of 
Loo 36 are heard of, the stupid become intelligent, and the 
wavering, determined. ’ ’ 

This is the moral of biography; yet it is hard for departed 
men to touch the quick like our own companions, whose 
names may not last as long. What is he whom I never think 
of? Whilst in every solitude are those who succor our genius 
and stimulate us in wonderful manners. There is a power in 
love to divine another’s destiny better than that other can 
and, by heroic encouragements, hold him to his task. What 
has friendship so signal as its sublime attraction to whatever 
virtue is in us? We will never more think cheaply of ourselves, 
or of life. We are piqued to some purpose, and the industry 
of the diggers on the railroad will not again shame us. 

Under this head too falls that homage, very pure as I 
think, which all ranks pay to the hero of the day, from Corio- 
lanus 37 and Gracchus 38 down to Pitt, 39 Lafayette, 40 Welling¬ 
ton, 41 Webster, 42 Lamartine. 43 Hear the shouts in the street! 
The people cannot see him enough. They delight in a man. 
Here is a head and a trunk! What a front! what eyes! Atlan- 
tean shoulders, 44 and the whole carriage heroic, with equal in¬ 
ward force to guide the great machine! This pleasure of full 
expression to that which, in their private experience is usually 
cramped and obstructed, runs also much higher, and is the 
secret of the reader’s joy in literary genius. Nothing is kept 
back. There is fire enough to fuse the mountain of ore. 
Shakespeare’s 45 principal merit maybe conveyed in saying that 
he of all men best understands the English language, and can 
say what he will. Yet these unchoked channels and floodgates 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


9 


of expression are only health or fortunate constitution. 
Shakespeare’s name suggests other and purely intellectual 
benefits. 

Senates and sovereigns have no compliment, with their 
medals, swords, and armorial coats, like the addressing to a 
human being thoughts out of a certain height, and presuppos¬ 
ing his intelligence. This honor, which is possible in personal 
intercourse scarcely twice in a lifetime, genius perpetually 
pays; contented if now and then in a century the proffer is 
accepted. The indicators of the values of matter are degraded 
to a sort of cooks and^onfectioners, on the appearance of 
the indicators of ideas. \ Genius is the naturalist or geographer 
of the supersensible regions, and draws their map; and, by 
acquainting us with new fields of activity, cools our affection 
for the old. These are at once accepted as the reality, of 
which the world we have conversed with is the show. J 

We go to the gymnasium and the swimming-school to see 
the power and beauty of the body; there is the like pleasure 
and a higher benefit from witnessing intellectual feats of all 
kinds; as feats of memory, of mathematical combination, 
great power of abstraction, the transmutings of the imagina¬ 
tion, even versatility and concentration, — as these acts ex¬ 
pose the invisible organs and members of the mind, which 
respond, member for member, to the parts of the body. For 
we thus enter a new gymnasium, and learn to choose men by 
their truest marks, taught, with Plato, 46 “to choose those who 
can, without aid from the eyes or any other sense, proceed to 
truth and to being.” Foremost among these activities are 
the summersaults, spells, and resurrections wrought by the 
imagination. When this wakes, a man seems to multiply 
ten times or a thousand times his force. It opens the de¬ 
licious sense of indeterminate size and inspires an audacious 
mental habit. We are as elastic as the gas of gunpowder, and 
a sentence in a book, or a word dropped in conversation, 
sets free our fancy, and instantly our heads are bathed with 


10 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


galaxies, and our feet tread the floor of the Pit. 47 And this 
benefit is real because we are entitled to these enlargements, 
and once having passed the bounds shall never again be quite 
the miserable pedants we were. 

The high functions of the intellect are so allied that some 
imaginative power usually appears in all eminent minds, even 
in arithmeticians of the first class, but especially in medita¬ 
tive men of an intuitive habit of thought. This class serve us, 
so that they have the perception of identity and the perception 
of reaction. The eyes of Plato, Shakespeare, Swedenborg, 
Goethe, 48 never shut on either of these laws. The perception 
of these laws is a kind of metre of the mind. Little minds are 
little through failure to see them. 

Even these feasts have their surfeit. Our delight in reason 
degenerates into idolatry of the herald. Especially when a 
mind, of powerful method has instructed men, we find the 
examples of oppression. The dominion of Aristotle, 49 the 
Ptolemaic astronomy, 60 the credit of Luther, 61 of Bacon, 62 of 
Locke; 63 — in religion the history of hierarchies, of saints, and 
the sects which have taken the name of each founder, are in 
point. Alas! every man is such a victim. The imbecility 
of men is always inviting the impudence of power. It is the 
delight of vulgar talent to dazzle and to blind the beholder. 
But true genius seeks to defend us from itself. True genius 
will not impoverish, but will liberate, and add new senses. 
If a wise man should appear in our village he would create, 
in those who conversed with him, a new consciousness of 
wealth, by opening their eyes to unobserved advantages; 
he would establish a sense of immovable equality, calm us 
with assurances that we could not be cheated; as every one 
would discern the checks and guaranties of condition. The 
rich would see their mistakes and poverty, the poor their 
escapes and resources. 

But nature brings all this about in due time. Rotation is 
her remedy. The soul is impatient of masters and eager for 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


ii 


change. Housekeepers say of a domestic who has„ been 
valuable, “She had lived with me long enough.” |We are 
tendencies, or rather, symptoms, and none of us complete. 
We touch and go, ami sip the foam of many lives. Rotation is 
the law of nature.^ When nature removes a great man, 
people explore the horizon for a successor; but none comes, 
and none will. His class is extinguished with him. In some 
other and quite different field the next man will appear; 
not Jefferson, 64 not Franklin, 56 but now a great salesman, 
then a road-contractor, then a student of fishes, then a 
buffalo-hunting explorer, or a semi-savage Western general. 
Thus we make a stand against our rougher masters; butagainst 
the best there is a finer remedy. The power which they 
communicate is not theirs. When we are exalted by ideas, 
we do not owe this to Plato, but to the idea, to which also 
Plato was debtor. 

I must not forget that we have a special debt to a single 
class. Life is a scale of degrees. Between rank and rank of 
our great men are wide intervals. Mankind have in all ages 
attached themselves to a few persons who either by the qual¬ 
ity of that idea they embodied or by the largeness of their 
reception were entitled to the position of leaders and law¬ 
givers. These teach us the qualities of primary nature, — 
admit us to the constitution of things. We swim, day by day, 
on a river of delusions and are effectually amused with houses 
and towns in the air, of which the men about us are dupes. 
But life is a sincerity. In lucid intervals we say, “Let there 
be an entrance opened for me into realities; I have worn the 
fool’s cap too long.” We will know the meaning of our econ¬ 
omies and politics. Give us the cipher, and if persons and 
things are scores of a celestial music, let us read off the strains. 
We have been cheated of our reason; yet there have been 
sane men, who enjoyed a rich arid related existence. What 
they know, they know for us. HW ith each new mind, a new 
secret of nature transpiresTTpor can the Bible be closed until 


12 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


the last great man is born. These men correct the delirium 
of the animal spirits, make us considerate, and engage us to 
new aims and powers. The veneration of mankind selects 
these for the highest place. Witness the multitude of statues, 
pictures, and memorials which recall their genius in every 
city, village, house, and ship: — 

“Ever their phantoms arise before us, 

Our loftier brothers, but one in blood; 

At bed and table they lord it o’er us 
With looks of beauty and words of good.” 66 

How to illustrate the distinctive benefit of ideas, the service 
rendered by those who introduce moral truths into the 
general mind? — I am plagued, in all my living, with a per¬ 
petual tariff of prices. If I work in my garden and prune an 
apple-tree, I am well enough entertained, and could continue 
indefinitely in the like occupation. But it comes to mind 
that a day is gone, and I have got this precious nothing done. 
I go to Boston or New York and run up and down on my 
affairs: they are sped, but so is the day. I am vexed by 
the recollection of this price I have paid for a trifling ad¬ 
vantage. I remember the peau d’dne 57 on which whoso sat 
should have his desire, but a piece of the skin was gone for 
every wish. I go to a convention of philanthropists. Do 
what I can, I cannot keep my eyes off the clock. But if there 
should appear in the company some gentle soul who knows 
little of persons or parties, of Carolina or Cuba, but who 
announces a law that disposes these particulars, and so 
certifies me of the equity which checkmates every false player, 
bankrupts every self-seeker, and apprises me of my inde¬ 
pendence on any conditions of country, or time, or human 
body, — that man liberates me; I forget the clock. I pass 
out of the sore relation to persons. I am healed of my hurts. 
I am made immortal by apprehending my possession of 
incorruptible goods. Here is great competition of rich and 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


13 


/ 

poor. We live in a market, where is only so much wheat, or 
wool, or land: and if I have so much more, every other must 
have so much less. I seem to have no good without breach of 
good manners. Nobody is glad in the gladness of another, 
and our system is one of war, of an injurious superiority. 
Every child of the Saxon race is educated to wish to be first. 
It is our system; and a man comes to measure his greatness 
by the regrets, envies, and hatreds of his competitors. But 
in these new fields there is room: here are no self-esteems, no 
exclusions. ^ 

I admire great men of all classes, those who stand for 
facts, and for thoughts; I like rough and smooth, “Scourges 
of God,” and “Darlings of the human race.” I like the first 
Caesar; 58 and Charles V., 59 of Spain; and Charles XII., 60 of 
Sweden; Richard Plantagenet; 61 and Bonaparte, 62 in France. 

I applaud a sufficient man, an officer equal to his office; 
captains, ministers, senators. I like a master standing firm on 
legs of iron, well-born, rich, handsome, eloquent, loaded with 
advantages, drawing all men by fascination into tributaries 
and supporters of his power. Sword and staff, or talents 
sword-like or staff-like, carry on the work of the world>"^ut 
I find him greater when he can abolish himself and all heroes, 
by letting in this element of reason, irrespective of persons, 
this subtilizer and irresistible upward force, into our thought, 
destroying individualism^ the power is so great that the 
potentate is nothing. Then he is a monarch who gives a 
constitution to his people; a pontiff who preaches the equality 
of souls and releases his servants from their barbarous hom¬ 
ages ; an emperor who can spare his empire. 

But I intended to specify, with a little minuteness, two or 
three points of service. Nature never spares the opium or 
nepenthe, 63 but wherever she mars her creature with some 
deformity or defect, lays her poppies plentifully on the bruise, 
and the sufferer goes joyfully through life, ignorant of the ruin 
and incapable of seeing it, though all the world point their 


14 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


/ finger at it every day. The worthless and offensive members 
of society, whose existence is a social pest, invariably think 
themselves the most ill-used people alive, and never get over 
their astonishment at the ingratitude and selfishness of their 
contemporaries. Our globe discovers its hidden virtues, not 
only in heroes and archangels, but in gossips and nurses. 
Is it not a rare contrivance that lodged the due inertia in 
every creature, the conserving, resisting energy, the anger at 
being waked or changed? Altogether independent of the 
intellectual force in each is the pride of opinion, the security 
that we are right. Not the feeblest grandame, not a mowing 
idiot, but uses what spark of perception and faculty is left, to 
chuckle and triumph in his or her opinion over the absurdi¬ 
ties of all the rest. Difference from me is the measure of 
absurdity. Not one has a misgiving of being wrong. Was 
not it a bright thought that made things cohere with this 
bitumen, fastest of cements? But, in the midst of this 
chuckle of self-gratulation, some figure goes by which Ther- 
sites 64 too can love and admire. This is he that should mar¬ 
shall us the way we were going. There is no end to his aid. 
Without Plato we should almost lose our faith in the possi¬ 
bility of a reasonable book. We seem to want but one, but 
we want one. We love to associate with heroic persons, since 
our receptivity is unlimited; and, with the great, our thoughts 
and manners easily become great. We are all wise in capacity, 
though so few in energy. There needs but one wise man in a 
company and all are wise, so rapid is the contagion. 

Great men are thus a collyrium 65 to clear our eyes from 
egotism and enable us to see other people and their works. 
But there are vices and follies incident to whole populations 
and ages. Men resemble their contemporaries even more 
than their progenitors. It is observed in old couples, or in 
persons who have been housemates for a course of years, that 
they grow like, and if they should live long enough we should 
not be able to know them apart. Nature abhors these com- 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


15 


plaisances which threaten to melt the world into a lump, 
and hastens to break up such maudlin agglutinations. The 
like assimilation goes on between men of one town, of one 
sect, of one political party; and the ideas of the time are in 
the air, and infect all who breathe it. Viewed from any 
high point, this city of New York, yonder city of London, 
the Western civilization, would seem a bundle of insanities. 
We keep each other in countenance and exasperate by emula¬ 
tion the frenzy of the time. The shield against the stingings 
of conscience is the universal practice, or our contemporaries. 
Again, it is very easy to be as wise and good as your com¬ 
panions. We learn of our contemporaries what they know, 
without effort, and almost through the pores of the skin. We 
catch it by sympathy, or as a wife arrrives at the intellectual 
and moral elevations of her husband. But we stop where 
they stop. Very hardly can we take another step. The 
great, or such as hold of nature and transcend fashions by 
their fidelity to universal ideas, are saviors from these federal 
errors, and defend us from our contemporaries. They are the 
exceptions which we want, where all grows like. A foreign 
greatness is the antidote for cabalism. 

Thus we feed on genius, and refresh ourselves from too 
much conversation with our mates, and exult in the depth of 
nature in that direction in which he leads us. What indemni¬ 
fication is one great man for populations of pigmies! Every 
mother wishes one son a genius, though all the rest should be 
mediocre. But a new danger appears in the excess of influ¬ 
ence of the great man. His attractions warp us from our 
place. We have become underlings and intellectual suicides. 
Ah! yonder in the horizon is our help; — other great men, new 
qualities, counterweights and checks on each other. We cloy 
of the honey of each peculiar greatness. Every hero becomes 
a bore at last. Perhaps Voltaire 66 was not bad-hearted, yet 
he said of the good Jesus, even, “I pray you, let me never 
hear that man’s name again.” They cry up the virtues of 


i6 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


George Washington, — “Damn George Washington!" is the 
poor Jacobin’s 67 whole speech and confutation. But it is 
human nature’s indispensable defence. The centripetence 
augments the centrifugence. We balance one man with his 
opposite, and the health of the state depends on the see-saw. 

There is however a speedy limit to the use of heroes. Every 
genius is defended from approach by quantities of unavailable¬ 
ness. They are very attractive, and seem at a distance our 
own: but we are hindered on all sides from approach. The 
more we are drawn, the more we are repelled. There is 
something not solid in the good that is done for us. The best 
discovery the discoverer makes for himselfIt has something 
unreal for his companion until he too has substantiated it. 
It seems as if the Deity dressed each soul which he sends into 
nature in certain virtues and powers not communicable to 
other men, and sending it to perform one more turn through 
the circle of beings, wrote “Not transferable ’’ and “Good for 
this trip only ," on these garments of the soul. There is some¬ 
thing somewhat deceptive about the intercourse of minds. The , 
boundaries are invisible, but they are never crossed. There is 
such good will to impart, and such good will to receive, that 
each threatens to become the other; but the law of individu¬ 
ality collects its secret strength: you are you, and I am I, 
and so we remain. 

For nature wishes every thing to remain itself; and whilst 
every individual strives to grow and exclude and to exclude 
and grow, to the extremities of the universe, and to impose 
the law of its being on every other creature, Nature steadily 
aims to protect each against every other. Each is self-de¬ 
fended. Nothing is more marked than the power by which 
individuals are guarded from individuals, in a world where 
every benefactor becomes so easily a malefactor only by 
continuation of his activity into places where it is not due; 
where children seem so much at the mercy of their foolish 
parents, and where almost all men are too social and inter- 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


17 


fering. We rightly speak of the guardian angels of children. 
How superior in their security from infusions of evil persons, 
from vulgarity and second thought! They shed their own 
abundant beauty on the objects they behold. Therefore 
they are not at the mercy of such poor educators as we adults. 
If we huff and chide them they soon come not to mind it and 
get a self-reliance; and if we indulge them to folly, they learn 
the limitation elsewhere. 

We need not fear excessive influence. A more generous 
trust is permitted. Serve the great. Stick at no humiliation. 
Grudge no office thou canst render. Be the limb of their body, 
the breath of their mouth. Compromise thy egotism. Who 
cares for that, so thou gain aught wider and nobler? Never 
mind the taunt of Boswellism: 68 the devotion may easily be 
greater than the wretched pride which is guarding its own 
skirts. Be another: not thyself, but a Platonist; 69 not a 
soul, but a Christian; not a naturalist, but a Cartesian; 70 
not a poet, but a Shakesperian. In vain, the wheels of 
tendency will not stop, nor will all the forces of inertia, fear, 
or of love itself hold thee there. On, and forever onward! 
The microscope observes a monad or wheel-insect among the 
infusions circulating in water. Presently a dot appears on 
the animal, which enlarges to a slit, and it becomes two per¬ 
fect animals. The ever-proceeding detachment appears not 
less in all thought and in society. Children think they cannot 
live without their parents. But, long before they are aware 
of it, the black dot has appeared and the detachment taken 
place. Any accident will now reveal to them their inde¬ 
pendence. 

But great men : — the word is injurious. Is there caste? is 
there fate? What becomes of the promise to virtue? The 
thoughtful youth laments the superfoetation of nature. 
“Generous and handsome,” he says, “is your hero; but look 
at yonder poor Paddy, whose country is his wheelbarrow; 
look at his whole nation of Paddies.” Why are the masses, 


i8 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


from the dawn of history down, food foi knives and powder? 
The idea dignifies a few leaders, who have sentiment, opinion, 
love, self-devotion; and they make war and death sacred; 
— but what for the wretches whom they hire and kill? The 
cheapness of man is every day’s tragedy. It is as real a loss 
that others should be low as that we should be low; for we 
must have society. 

Is it a reply to these suggestions to say, Society is a Pesta- 
lozzian 71 school: all are teachers and pupils in turn? We are 
equally served by receiving and by imparting. Men who know 
the same things are not long the best company for each other. 
But bring to each an intelligent person of another experience, 
and it is as if you let off water from a lake by cutting a lower 
basin. It seems a mechanical advantage, and great benefit 
it is to each speaker, as he can now paint out his thought to 
himself. We pass very fast, in our personal moods, from 
dignity to dependence. And if any appear never to assume 
the chair, but always to stand and serve, it is because we do 
not see the company in a sufficiently long period for the 
whole rotation of parts to come about. As to what we call 
the masses, and common men, —there are no common men. 
All men are at last of a size; and true art is only possible on 
the conviction that every talent has its apotheosis some¬ 
where. Fair play and an open field and freshest laurels to all 
who have won them! But heaven reserves an equal scope 
for every creature. Each is uneasy until he has produced his 
private ray unto the concave sphere and beheld his talent 
also in its last nobility and exaltation. 

The heroes of the hour are relatively great; of a faster 
growth; or they are such in whom, at the moment of success, 
a quality is ripe which is then in request. Other days will 
demand other qualities. Some rays escape the common 
observer, and want a finely adapted eye. Ask the great man 
if there be none greater. His companions are; and not the 
less great but the more that society cannot see them. Nature 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


19 


never sends a great man into the planet without confiding the 
secret to another soul. 

One gracious fact emerges from these studies, — that there 
is true ascension in our love. The reputations of the nine¬ 
teenth century will one day be quoted to prove its barbarism. 
The genius of humanity is the real subject whose biography is 
written in our annals. We must infer much, and supply 
many chasms in the record. The history of the universe is 
symptomatic, and life is mnemonical. 72 No man, in all the 
procession of famous men, is reason or illumination or that 
essence we were looking for; but is an exhibition, in some 
quarter, of new possibilities. Could we one day complete 
the immense figure which these flagrant points compose! 
The study of many individuals leads us to an elemental 
region wherein the individual is lost, or wherein all touch by 
their summits. Thought and feeling that break out there 
cannot be impounded by any fence of personality. This is 
the key to the power of the greatest men, — their spirit 
diffuses itself. A new quality of mind travels by night and 
by day, in concentric circles from its origin, and publishes 
itself by unknown methods: the union of all minds appears 
intimate; what gets admission to one, cannot be kept out of 
any other; the smallest acquisition of truth or of energy, in 
any quarter, is so much good to the commonwealth of souls. 
^If the disparities of talent and position vanish when the 
Tndividuals are seen in the duration which is necessary to 
complete the career of each, even more swiftly the seeming 
injustice disappears when we ascend to the central indentity 
of all the individuals, and know that they are made of the 
substance which ordaineth and doeth. 

The genius of humanity is the right point of view of history. 
The qualities abide; the men who exhibit them have now 
more, now less, and pass away; the qualities remain on an¬ 
other brow. No experience is more familiar. Once you saw 
phoenixes: 73 they are gone; the world is not therefore dis- 


20 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


enchanted. The vessels on which you read sacred emblems 
turn out to be common pottery; but the sense of the pictures 
is sacred, and you may still read them transferred to the walls 
of the world. For a time our teachers serve us personally, 
as metres or milestones of progress. Once they were angels of 
knowledge and their figures touched the sky. Then we drew 
near, saw their means, culture, and limits; and they yielded 
their place to other geniuses. Happy, if a few names remain 
so high that we have not been able to read them nearer, and 
age and comparison have not robbed them of a ray. (But at 
last we shall cease to look in men for completeness, and shall 
content ourselves with their social and delegated quality. 
All that respects the individual is temporary and prospective, 
like the individual himself, who is ascending out of his limits 
into a catholic existence. / We have never come at the true 
and best benefit of any genius so long as we believe him an 
original force. In the moment when he ceases to help us as a 
cause, he begins to help us more as an effect. Then he appears 
as an exponent of a vaster mind and will. The opaque self 
becomes transparent with the light of the First Cause . 74 

Yet, within the limits of human education and agency, we 
may say great men exist that there may be greater men. 
The destiny of organized nature is amelioration, and who can 
tell its limits? It is for man to tame the chaos; on every 
side, whilst he lives, to scatter the seeds of science and of 
song, that climate, corn, animals, men, may be milder, and 
the germs of love and benefit may be multiplied. 


NOTES 

1 The family name of the great religious teacher of early India, 
popularly known as Buddha, or the “enlightened one,” who lived 
in the sixth century B.c. He taught that the cause of misery and 
sorrow was desire, and that to pluck desire from the heart was 
the way to peace. 

2 A city and province of Spain. 


21 


USES OF GREAT MEN 

. 3 A river in California. Emerson is referring to the region at the 
time when it was the center of the gold rush in 1848. 

4 Thebes was a celebrated city of ancient Egypt, for centuries 
the capital of the country. The tombs of the Egyptian kings were 
located there, their invariable design being in the form of the 
pyramid. 

5 Emerson coined this form, in the sense of “the most differ¬ 
ent.” 

6 Literal meaning, “ growing from within ”; applied erroneously 
in the science of botany to species of plants once thought to 
attain their structure in that fashion. 

7 “Little effort, great result.” 

8 Anything composed of mixed elements. Commonly used 
in stock or plant breeding. 

9 . A pretentious, conceited, or affected person. The name is 
derived from the peculiar cap worn by court jesters, which had a 
semblance to a cock’s comb. 

10 Behmen, (Bcehme, Boehm) Jacob, a German philosopher and 
mystic (1575-1624). 

11 Swedenborg , Emanuel, Swedish scientist and theologian, 
founder of the modern sect called “The New Church” or “The 
Church of the New Jerusalem” (1688-1772). 

12 Linnaeus , Carious. Latin form of the name Carl von Linne. 
Swedish naturalist who originated the modern system of naming 
plants and animals (1707-1778). 

13 Huber , Francois, a Swiss naturalist famous for his pioneer 
researches concerning the life and habits of honeybees (1750- 
i 8 3 1 )- 

14 Fries , Elias Magnus, eminent Swedish botanist, who made 
especial contributions to the knowledge of fungi, lichens, and 
mosses (1794-1878). 

15 Von Mons, Dr. J. R., a Belgian chemist noted for agriculture 
and fruit-growing, especially pears (1765-1842). 

16 Dalton , John, a celebrated English chemist and natural 
philosopher distinguished for his development of the atomic 
theory (1766-1844). 

17 Euclid , an eminent geometrician of Alexandria who taught 
about 300 b.c. He derived his renown from his work, The Ele¬ 
ments of Geometry. 

18 Newton , Sir Isaac, a most illustrious English philosopher, 
who made remarkable discoveries in science, mathematics, and 
astronomy. Popularly known for his formulation of the law of 
gravitation (1642-1727). 

19 A mathematical term indicating the rate of change of a 
continuously varying quantity. The “method of fluxions” was 
invented by Sir Isaac Newton. 

20 Gilbert , William, a learned English physician who first dis¬ 
covered some of the properties of the magnet (1540-1603). 


22 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


21 CErsted, Hans Christian, a distinguished Danish scientist who 
discovered electro-magnetism, which led to the development of 
the electric telegraph (1777-1851). 

22 Werner, Abraham Gottlob, a celebrated German mineralogist 
(1750-1817). 

23 Von Buck, Christian Leopold, Baron, an eminent Prussian 
geographer, geologist, and paleontologist (1774-1853). 

24 Beaumont, William, an American physician who attained 
wide celebrity through his experiments on the processes of di¬ 
gestion (1785-1853). 

26 Berzelius, Baron, a native of Sweden, one of the eminent 
chemists of modern times (1779-1848). 

26 Davy, Sir Humphrey, an eminent English chemist (1778- 
1829). 

27 “As if,” e.g., not fully genuine. 

28 Napoleon Bonaparte, emperor of France, defeated by the 
Duke of Wellington at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 (1769-1821). 

29 Cecil, William, Lord Burleigh, lord treasurer of England 
during the reign of Queen Elizabeth (1520-1598). 

30 Raleigh, Sir Walter, British explorer, poet, and historian 
(1552-1618). 

31 Clarendon, Edward Hyde, first Earl of, an adherent of the 
Stuart cause and lord chancellor of England after the Restoration. 
He wrote a history of the Civil War (1609-1674). 

32 Hampden, John, an illustrious English patriot, a leader of the 
House of Commons (1594-1643). 

33 Falkland, Lucius Carey, Viscount of, an illustrious English 
statesman, noted for brilliance and integrity (1610-1643). 

34 Greek philosopher and historian. He was appointed consul 
by the Roman emperor Trajan. His most important work was 
The Lives of Illustrious Men ( ca . 46-120 a. d.). 

35 Chinese moral teacher second only to Confucius (372- 
287 B.C.). 

36 Lu was the ancient seat of the Chinese royal family, the state 
or province of China associated with Confucius and his follow¬ 
ers. Natually, manners there would be superior. 

37 Coriolanus, Gaius Marcius, Roman legendary hero of 
patrician descent. 

38 There were two Roman statesmen by this name, brothers; 
Gaius Sempronius, (ca. 153-121 b.c.) and Tiberius Sempronius, 
(ca. 162-133 b.c.). 

39 Pitt, William, Earl of Chatham, English statesman of the 
reign of George III (1708-1778). 

40 Lafayette, Gilbert Mottier, Marquis de, one of the most 
distinguished patriots of the eighteenth century. He espoused 
the cause of the American Revolution and served as major- 
general in the American army. Later, he was exiled from France 
as a result of his patriotic efforts in the French Revolution (1757- 

1834)- 


USES OF GREAT MEN 


23 

41 Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of, English general who 
conquered Napoleon at Waterloo (1769-1852). 

42 Webster, Daniel, one of the greatest of American statesmen 
and jurists (1782-1832). 

43 Lamartine, Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de, French poet, 
historian, and statesman (1790-1869). 

44 Pertaining to Atlas, the mythical giant who was supposed to 
hold up the world on his shoulders. 

45 (1564-1616). 

46 Athenian philosopher, founder of the first great philosophical 
school, called the Academy (427-347 b.c.). 

47 Hell. 

48 Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, Germany’s greatest poet 
(1749^1832). 

49 The most celebrated of the Greek philosophers (384-322 
B.C.). 

60 Ptolemy wrote a cyclopaedia of astronomy in which he held 
that the earth is fixed as the center of the universe (ca. 130 a.d.). 

51 Luther, Martin, German leader of the Reformation (1483- 
T 546 ). 

52 Bacon, Sir Francis, English philosopher and scientist of the 
age of Queen Elizabeth (1561-1626). 

53 Locke, John, English philosopher (1632-1704). 

54 Jefferson, Thomas, third president of the United States and 
writer of the Declaration of Independence (1743-1826). 

65 (1706-1790). 

56 From John Sterling’s poem, Dcedalus. 

67 “Skin of an ass,” used by Balzac in the plot of The Wild 
Asses' Skin. 

68 Gaius Julius Caesar (102-44 b.c.). 

59 Roman emperor, German king, Duke of Burgundy, and, 
(as Charles I), king of Spain and the Sicilies (1500-1558). 

60 A Swedish king, ambitious for conquest (1682-1718). 

61 Known as Coeur de Lion or the Lion-hearted (1157-1197). 

62 See note 28 on Napoleon. 

63 A drug or potion reputed among the ancients to banish care 
and sorrow. 

64 An officer, the most deformed and illiberal of the Greeks 
during the Trojan War. He was killed by Achilles because he 
ridiculed that hero. 

65 A medicated application for diseased eyes; sometimes used 
as a beautifier. 

66 Voltaire, Frangois Marie Arouet de, French historian, dram¬ 
atist, and philosopher, noted for his radical views (1694-1778). 

67 A member of & radical society in France during the French 
Revolution, which, under Robespierre, led to the Reign of Terror. 

68 An adjective referring to James Boswell, a Scottish lawyer, 
famous as the biographer of Dr. Johnson (1740-1795). 


24 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


69 A follower of the system of teaching set forth by Plato. 

70 A follower of the French philosopher, Descartes (1596- 
i 6 5 °). 

71 Followers of a Swiss pioneer in modern psychological 
methods of teaching, Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827). 

72 Pertaining to, aiding, or designed to aid the memory. 

73 Fabulous birds, one of which was the supposed mythological 
ancestor of the Phoenician race. Later, associated with the 
worship of Ra, the sun god of Egypt. In alchemy, a symbol of 
fire; in religion, a symbol of immortality. 

74 The Creator. 


II 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

A MONG secular books, Plato only is entitled to Omar’s 1 
fanatical compliment to the Koran, 2 when he said, 
‘‘Burn the libraries; for their value is in this book.” These 
sentences contain the culture of nations; these are the corner¬ 
stone of schools; these are the fountain-head of literatures. 
A discipline it is in logic, arithmetic, taste, symmetry, poetry, 
language, rhetoric, ontology, 3 morals, or practical wisdom. 
There was never such range of speculation. Out of Plato 
come all things that are still written and debated among men 
of thought. Great havoc makes he among our originalities. 
We have reached the mountain from which all these drift 
boulders were detached. The Bible of the learned for twenty- 
two hundred years, every brisk young man who says in 
succession fine things to each reluctant generation, — Boe¬ 
thius, 4 Rabelais, 5 Erasmus, 6 Bruno, 7 Locke, 8 Rousseau, 9 
Alfieri, 10 Coleridge, 11 — is some reader of Plato, translating 
into the vernacular, 12 wittily, his good things. Even the men 
of grander proportion suffer some deduction from the mis¬ 
fortune (shall I say?) of coming after this exhausting gen- 
eralizer. St. Augustine, 13 Copernicus, 14 Newton, 15 Behmen, 16 
Swedenborg, 17 Goethe, 18 are likewise his debtors and must say 
after him. For it is fair to credit the broadest generalizer 
with all the particulars deducible from his thesis. 

Plato is philosophy, and philosophy, Plato, — at once the 
glory and the shame of mankind, since neither Saxon 19 nor 
Roman 20 have availed to add any idea to his categories. 
No wife, no children had he, and the thinkers of all civilized 
nations are his posterity and are tinged with his mind. How 

25 


26 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


many great men Nature is incessantly sending up out of 
night, to be his men ,— Platonists! the Alexandrians, 21 a 
constellation of genius; the Elizabethans, 22 not less; Sir 
Thomas More, 23 Henry More, 24 John Hales, 26 John Smith, 26 
Lord Bacon, 27 Jeremy Taylor, 28 Ralph Cudworth, 29 Syden¬ 
ham, 30 Thomas Taylor, 31 Marcilius Ficinus, 32 and Picus # 
Mirandola. 33 Calvinism 34 is in his Phaedo: 35 Christianity is 
in it. Mahometanism draws all its philosophy, in its hand¬ 
book of morals, the Akhlak-y-Jalaly, 36 from him. Mysti¬ 
cism 37 finds in Plato all its texts. This citizen of a town in 
Greece is no villager nor patriot. An Englishman reads and 
says, “How English!”, a German, — “How Teutonic!”, an 
Italian, — “How Roman and how Greek!” As they say that 
Helen of Argos 38 had that universal beauty that every body 
felt related to her, so Plato seems to a reader in New England 
an American genius. His broad humanity transcends all 
sectional lines. 

This range of Plato instructs us what to think of the vexed 
question concerning his reputed works, — what are genuine 
what spurious. It is singular that wherever we find a man 
higher by a whole head than any of his contemporaries, it is 
sure to come into doubt what are his real works. Thus 
Homer, 39 Plato, Raffaelle, 40 Shakespeare. For these men 
magnetise their contemporaries, so that their companions 
can do for them what they can never do for themselves; 
and the great man does thus live in several bodies, and write, 
or paint or act, by many hands; and after some time it is 
not easy to say what is the authentic work of the master and 
what is only of his school. 

Plato, too, like every great man, consumed his own times. 
What is a great man but one of great affinities, who takes up 
into himself all arts, sciences, all knowables, as his food? 
He can spare nothing; he can dispose of every thing. What 
is not good for virtue, is good for knowledge. Hence his 
contemporaries tax him with plagiarism. 41 But the inventor 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 


27 


only knows how to borrow; and society is glad to forget the 
innumerable laborers who ministered to this architect, and 
reserves all its gratitude for him. When we are praising 
Plato, it seems we are praising quotations from Solon 42 and 
Sophron 43 and Philolaus. 44 Be it so. Every book is a quo¬ 
tation; and every house is a quotation out of all forests and 
mines and stone quarries; and every man is a quotation from 
all his ancestors. And this grasping inventor puts all nations 
under contribution. 

Plato absorbed the learning of his times, — Philolaus, 
Timaeus, 45 Heraclitus, 46 Parmenides, 47 and what else; then 
his master, Socrates; 48 and finding himself still capable of 
a larger synthesis, — beyond all example then or since, — 
he travelled into Italy, to gain what Pythagoras 49 had for 
him; then into Egypt, and perhaps still farther East, to 
import the other element, which Europe wanted, into the 
European mind. This breadth entitles him to stand as the 
representative of philosophy. He' says, in the Republic, 50 
“Such a genius as philosophers must of necessity have, is 
wont but seldom in all its parts to meet in one man, but its 
different parts generally spring up in different persons. ” 
Every man who would do anything well, must come to it 
from a higher ground. A philosopher must be more than a 
philosopher. Plato is clothed with the powers of a poet, 
stands upon the highest place of the poet, and (though I 
doubt he wanted the decisive gift of lyric expression), mainly 
is not a poet because he chose to use the poetic gift to an 
ulterior purpose. 

Great geniuses have the shortest biographies. Their cousins 
can tell you nothing about them. They lived in their writings, 
and so their house and street life was trivial and commonplace. 
If you would know their tastes and complexions, the most 
admiring of their readers most resembles them. Plato es¬ 
pecially has no external biography. If he had lover, wife, or 
children, we hear nothing of them. He ground them all into 


28 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


paint. As a good chimney burns its smoke, so a philosopher 
converts the value of all his fortunes into his intellectual per¬ 
formances. 

He was born 427, b.c ., 61 about the time of the death of 
Pericles; 52 was of patrician connection in his times and city, 
and is said to have had an early inclination for war, but, in 
his twentieth year, meeting with Socrates, was easily dis¬ 
suaded from this pursuit and remained for ten years his scholar, 
until the death of Socrates. He then went to Megara, 63 
accepted the invitations of Dion 54 and of Dionysius 55 to 
the court of Sicily, and went thither three times, though 
very capriciously treated. He travelled into Italy; then 
into Egypt, where he stayed a long time; some say three, — 
some say thirteen years. It is said he went farther, into 
Babylonia: this is uncertain. Returning to Athens, he gave 
lessons in the Academy 66 to those whom his fame drew thither; 
and died, as we have received it, in the act of writing, at 
eighty-one years. 

But the biography of Plato is interior. We are to account 
for the supreme elevation of this man in the intellectual 
history of our race, — how it happens that in proportion to 
the culture of men they become his scholars; that, as our 
Jewish Bible has implanted itself in the table-talk and house¬ 
hold life of every man and woman in the European and 
American nations, so the writings of Plato have preoccupied 
every school of learning, every lover of thought, every church, 
every poet, — making it impossible to think, on certain levels, 
except through him. He stands between the truth and every 
man’s mind, and has almost impressed language and the 
primary forms of thought with his name and seal. I am 
struck, in reading him, with the extreme modernness of his 
style and spirit. Here is the germ of that Europe we know 
so well, in its long history of arts and arms; here are all its 
traits, already discernible in the mind of Plato, — and in none 
before him. It has spread itself since into a hundred histories, 


29 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

but has added no new element. This perpetual modernness 
is the measure of merit in every work of art; since the author 
of it was not misled by any thing short-lived or local, but 
abode by real and abiding traits. How Plato came thus to be 
Europe, and philosophy, and almost literature, is the problem 
for us to solve. 

This could not have happened without a sound, sincere, and 
catholic 57 man, able to honor, at the same time, the ideal, 
or laws of the mind, and fate, or the order of nature. The 
first period of a nation, as of an individual, is the period of 
unconscious strength. Children cry, scream, and stamp with 
fury, unable to express their desires. As soon as they can 
speak and tell their want and the reason of it, they become 
gentle. In adult life, whilst the perceptions are obtuse, men 
and women talk vehemently and superlatively, blunder and 
quarrel: their manners are full of desperation; their speech is 
full of oaths. As soon as, with culture, things have cleared up 
a little, and they see them no longer in lumps and masses 
but accurately distributed, they desist from that weak ve¬ 
hemence and explain their meaning in detail. If the tongue 
had not been framed for articulation, man would still be a 
beast in the forest. The same weakness and want, on a higher 
plane, occurs daily in the education of ardent young men and 
women. “Ah! you don’t understand me; I have never met 
with any one who comprehends me: ” and they sigh and weep, 
write verses and walk alone, — fault of power to express their 
precise meaning. In a month or two, through the favor of 
their good genius, they meet some one so related as to assist 
their volcanic estate, and, good communication being once 
established, they are thenceforward good citizens. It is ever 
thus. The progress is to accuracy, to skill, to truth, from 
blind force. 

There is a moment in the history of every nation, when, 
proceeding out of this brute youth, the perceptive powers 
reach their ripeness and have not yet become microscopic: 


3o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


so that man, at that instant, extends across the entire scale, 
and, with his feet still planted on the immense forces of night, 
converses by his eyes and brain with solar and stellar creation. 
That is the moment of adult health, the culmination of 
power. 

Such is the history of Europe, in all points; and such is 
philosophy. Its early records, almost perished, are of the 
immigrations from Asia, bringing with them the dreams of 
barbarians; a confusion of crude notions of morals and of 
natural philosophy, gradually subsiding through the partial 
insight of single teachers. 

Before Pericles came the Seven Wise Masters, 68 and we 
have the beginnings of geometry, metaphysics, and ethics: 
then the partialists, 59 — deducing the origin of things from 
flux or water, or from air, or from fire, or from mind. All 
mix with these causes mythologic pictures. At last comes 
Plato, the distributor, who needs no barbaric paint, or tattoo, 
or whooping; 60 for he can define. He leaves with Asia the 
vast and superlative; he is the arrival of accuracy and in¬ 
telligence. “He shall be as a god to me, who can rightly 
divide and define.” ' 5 

This defining is philosophy. Philosophy is the account 
which the human mind gives to itself of the constitution of 
the world. Two cardinal facts lie forever at the base; the 
one, and the two. — I. Unity, or Identity; and, 2. Variety. 
We unite all things by perceiving the law which peryades 
them; by perceiving the superficial differences and the pro¬ 
found resemblances. But every mental act, — this very 
perception of identity or oneness, recognizes the difference of 
things. Oneness and otherness. It is impossible to speak or to 
think without embracing both 7 \ 

The mind is urged to ask for one cause of many effects; 
then for the cause of that; and again the cause, diving still 
into the profound: self-assured that it shall arrive at an abso¬ 
lute and sufficient one, —a one that shall be all. “In the 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 


3i 


midst of the sun is the light, in the midst of the light is truth, 
and in the midst of truth is the imperishable being,” say the 
Vedas. 61 All philosophy, of East and West, has the same 
centripetence. 62 Urged by an opposite necessity, the mind 
returns from the one to that which is not one, but other or 
many; from cause to effect; and affirms the necessary exist¬ 
ence of variety, the self-existence of both, as each is involved 
in the other. These strictly-blended elements it is the problem 
of thought to separate and to reconcile. Their existence is 
mutually contradictory and exclusive; and each so fast slides 
into the other that we can never say what is one, and what it 
is not. The Proteus 63 is as nimble in the highest as in the 
lowest grounds; when we contemplate the one, the true, the 
good, — as in the surfaces and extremities of matter. 

In all nations there are minds which incline to dwell in the 
conception of the fundamental Unity. The raptures of prayer 
and ecstasy of devotion lose all being in one Being. This 
tendency finds its highest expression in the religious writings 
of the East, and chiefly in the Indian Scriptures, in the Vedas, 
the Bhagavat Geeta, 64 and the Vishnu Purana. 65 Those 
writings contain little else than this idea, and they rise to 
pure and sublime strains in celebrating it. 

The Same, the Same: friend and foe are of one stuff; the 
ploughman, the plough, and the furrow are of one stuff; 
and the stuff is such and so much that the variations of form 
are unimportant. “You are fit” (says the supreme Krishna 66 
to a sage) “to apprehend that you are not distinct from me. 
That which I am, thou art, and that also is this world, with 
its gods and heroes and mankind. Men contemplate distinc¬ 
tions, because they are stupefied with ignorance.” “The 
words I and mine constitute ignorance. What is the great end 
of all, you shall now learn from me. It is soul, — one in all 
bodies, pervading, uniform, perfect, preeminent over nature, 
exempt from birth, growth, and decay, omnipresent, made up 
of true knowledge, independent, unconnected with unreali- 


32 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


ties,, with name, species, and the rest, in time past, present, 
and to come. The knowledge that this spirit, which is essen¬ 
tially one, is in one’s own and in all other bodies, is the wisdom 
of one who knows the unity of things. As one diffusive air, 
passing through the perforations of a flute, is distinguished as 
the notes of a scale, so the nature of the Great Spirit is single, 
though its forms be manifold, arising from the consequences of 
acts. When the difference of the investing form, as that of 
god or the rest, is destroyed, there is no distinction.” “The 
whole world is but a manifestation of Vishnu, who is identical 
with all things, and is to be regarded by the wise as not differ¬ 
ing from but as the same as themselves. I neither am going 
nor coming; nor is my dwelling in any one place; nor art 
thou, thou; nor are others, others; nor am I, I.” As if he 
had said, “All is for the soul, and the soul is Vishnu; and 
animals and stars are transient paintings; and light is white¬ 
wash ; and durations are deceptive; and form is im¬ 
prisonment; and heaven a decoy.” That which the soul seeks 
is resolution into being above form, out of Tartarus 67 and 
out of heaven, — liberation from nature. 

If speculation tends thus to a terrific unity, in which all 
things are absorbed, action tends directly backwards to 
diversity. The first is the course or gravitation of mind; 
the second is the power of nature. Nature is the manifold. 
The unity absorbs, and melts or reduces. Nature opens and 
creates. These two principles reappear and interpenetrate 
all things, all thought; the one, the many. One is being; 
the other, intellect: one is necessity; the other, freedom: 
one, rest; the other, motion: one, power; the other, dis¬ 
tribution: one, strength; the other, pleasure: one, con¬ 
sciousness; the other, definition: one, genius; the other, 
talent: one, earnestness; the other, knowledge: one, 
possession; the other, trade: one, caste; the other, culture: 
one, king; the other, democracy: and, if we dare carry these 
generalizations a step higher, and name the last tendency of 


33 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

both, we might say, that the end of the one is escape from 
organization,—pure science; and the end of the other is 
the highest instrumentality, or use of means, or executive 
de: 



Each student adheres, by temperament and by habit, to 
the first or to the second of these gods of the mind. By 
religion, he tends to unity; by intellect, or by the senses, 
to the many. A too rapid unification, and an excessive appli¬ 
ance to parts and particulars, are the twin dangers of specula¬ 
tion. 

To this partiality the history of nations corresponded. The 
country of unity, of immovable institutions, the seat of a 
philosophy delighting in abstractions, of men faithful in 
doctrine and in practice to the idea of a deaf, unimplorable, 
immense fate, is Asia; and it realizes this faith in the social 
institution of caste. 68 On the other side, the genius of Europe 
is active and creative: it resists caste by culture; its philos¬ 
ophy was a discipline; it is a land of arts, inventions, trade, 
freedom. If the East loved infinity, the West delighted in 
boundaries. 

European civility is the triumph of talent, the extension of 
system, the sharpened understanding, adaptive skill, delight 
in forms, delight in manifestation, in comprehensible results. 
Pericles, Athens, Greece, had been working in this element 
with the joy of genius not yet chilled by any foresight of the 
detriment of an excess. They saw before them no sinister 
political economy; no ominous Malthus; 69 no Paris or 
London; no pitiless subdivision of classes, — the doom of the 
pin-makers, 70 the doom of the weavers, of dressers, of stock- 
ingers, of carders, of spinners, of colliers; no Ireland; no 
Indian caste, superinduced by the efforts of Europe to throw it 
off. The understanding was in its health and prime. Art was 
in its splendid novelty. They cut the Pentelican marble 71 as 
if it were snow, and their perfect works in architecture and 
sculpture seemed things of course, not more difficult than the 


34 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


completion of a new ship at the Medford yards, 72 or new mills 
at Lowell. 73 These things are in course, and may be taken 
for granted. The Roman legion, Byzantine legislation, 74 
English trade, the saloons of Versailles, 75 the cafes of Paris, the 
steam-mill, steamboat, steam-coach, may all be seen in 
perspective; the town-meeting, 76 the ballot-box, the news¬ 
paper, and cheap press. 

Meantime, Plato, in Egypt and in Eastern pilgrimages, 
imbibed the idea of one Deity, in which all things are ab¬ 
sorbed. The unity of Asia and the detail of Europe; the 
infinitude of the Asiastic soul and the defining, result-loving, 
machine-making, surface-seeking, opera-going Europe, — 
Plato came to join, and, by contact, to enhance the energy 
of each. The excellence of Europe and Asia are in his brain. 
Metaphysics and natural philosophy expressed the genius of 
Europe; he substructs the religion of Asia, as the base. 

In short, a balanced soul was born, perceptive of the two 
elements. It is as easy to be great as to be small. The reason 
why we do not at once believe in admirable souls is because 
they are not in our experience. In actual life, they are so 
rare as to be incredible; but primarily there is not only no 
presumption against them, but the strongest presumption in 
favor of their appearance. But whether voices were heard in 
the sky, or not; whether his mother or his father dreamed that 
the infant man-child was the son of Apollo; 77 whether a 
swarm of bees settled on his lips, 78 orjiot; — a man who could 
see two sides of a thing was born. The wonderful synthesis so 
familiar in nature; the upper ancfthe under side of the medal 
of Jove; 79 the union of impossibilities, which reappears in 
every object; its real and its ideal power, —was now also 
transferred entire to the consciousness of a man. ) 

The balanced soul came. If he loved abstract truth, he 
saved himself by propounding the most popular of all prin¬ 
ciples, the absolute good, which rules rulers, and judges the 
judge. If he made transcendental distinctions, he fortified 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 35 

himself by drawing all his illustrations from sources disdained 
by orators and polite conversers; from mares and puppies; 
from pitchers and soup-ladles; from cooks and criers; the 
shops of potters, horse-doctors, butchers, and fishmongers. 
He cannot forgive in himself a partiality, but is resolved that 
the two poles of thought shall appear in his statement. His 
argument and his sentence are self-poised and spherical. The 
two poles appear; yes, and become two hands, to grasp and 
appropriate their own. 

Every great artist has been such by synthesis. Our strength 
is transitional, alternating; or, shall I say, a thread of two 
strands. The sea-shore, sea seen from shore, shore seen from 
sea; the taste of two metals in contact; and our enlarged 
powers at the approach and at the departure of a friend; the 
experience of poetic creativeness, which is not found in 
staying at home, nor yet in travelling, but in transitions from 
one to the other, which must therefore be adroitly managed 
to present as much transitional surface as possible; this 
command of two elements must explain the power and the 
charm of Plato. Art expresses the one or the same by the 
different. Thought seeks to know unity in unity; poetry to 
show it by variety; that is, always by an object or symbol. 
Plato keeps the two vases, one of aether and one of pigment, 
at his side, and invariably uses both. Things added to things, 
as statistics, civil history, are inventories. Things used as 
language are inexhaustibly attractive. Plato turns incessantly 
the obverse and the reverse of the medal of Jove. 79 

To take an example: — The physical philosophers had 
sketched each his theory of the world; the theory of atoms, 
of fire, of flux, of spirit; theories mechanical and chemical in 
their genius. Plato, a master of mathematics, studious of 
all natural laws and causes, feels these, as second causes, to 
be no theories of the world but bare inventories and lists. 
To the study of nature he therefore prefixes the dogma, — 
“Let us declare the cause which led the Supreme Ordainer to 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


36 

produce and compose the universe. He was good; and he 
who is good has no kind of envy. Exempt from envy, he 
wished that all things should be as much as possible like 
himself. Whosoever, taught by wise men, shall admit this 
as the prime cause of the origin and foundation of the world, 
will be in the truth.” “All things are for the sake of the 
good, and it is the cause of every thing beautiful.” This 
dogma animates and impersonates his philosophy. 

The synthesis 80 which makes the character of his mind 
appears in all his talents. Where there is great compass of 
wit, we usually find excellencies that combine easily in the 
living man, but in description appear incompatible. The 
mind of Plato is not to be exhibited by a Chinese catalogue, 
but is to be apprehended by an original mind in the exercise 
of its original power. In him the freest abandonment is 
united with the precision of a geometer. His daring imagi¬ 
nation gives him the more solid grasp of facts; as the birds of 
highest flight have the strongest alar bones. 81 His patrician 
polish, his intrinsic elegance, edged by an irony so subtle that 
it stings and paralyzes, adorn the soundest health and strength 
of frame. According to the old sentence, “If Jove should 
descend to the earth, he would speak in the style of Plato.” 

With this palatial air there is, for the direct aim of several 
of his works and running through the tenor of them all, a 
certain earnestness, which mounts, in the Republic and in 
the Phaedo, to piety. He has been charged with feigning 
sickness at the time of the death of Socrates. But the anec¬ 
dotes that have come down from the times attest his manly 
interference before the people in his master’s behalf, since even 
the savage cry of the assembly to Plato is preserved; and the 
indignation towards popular government, in many of his 
pieces, expresses a personal exasperation. He has a probity, a 
native reverence for justice and honor, and a humanity which 
makes him tender for the superstitions of the people. Add 
to this, he believes that poetry, prophecy, and the high insight 


37 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

are from a wisdom of which man is not master; that the gods 
never philosophize, but by a celestial mania these miracles are 
accomplished. Horsed on these winged steeds, he sweeps 
the dim regions, visits worlds which flesh cannot enter; he 
saw the souls in pain, he hears the doom of the judge, he 
beholds the penal metempsychosis, 82 the Fates, 83 with the 
rock and shears, and hears the intoxicating hum of their 
spindle. 

But his circumspection never forsook him. One would say 
he had read the inscription on the gates of Busyrane, 84 — 
“Be bold,” and on the second gate, — “Be bold, be bold, 
and evermore be bold”; and then again had paused well at 
the third gate, — “Be not too bold.” His strength is like 
the momentum of a falling planet, and his discretion the re¬ 
turn of its due and perfect curve, — so excellent is his Greek 
love of boundary and his skill in definition. In reading 
logarithms one is not more secure than in following Plato in 
his flights. Nothing can be colder than his head, when the 
lightnings of his imagination are playing in the sky. He has 
finished his thinking before he brings it to the reader, and he 
abounds in the surprises of a literary master. He has that 
opulence which furnishes, at every turn, the precise weapon 
he needs. As the rich man wears no more garments, drives no 
more horses, sits in no more chambers than the poor, — 
but has that one dress, or equipage, or instrument, which is fit 
for the hour and the need; so Plato, in his plenty, is never 
restricted, but has the fit word. There is indeed no weapon 
in all the armory of wit which he did not possess and use, — 
epic, analysis, mania, intuition, music, satire, and irony, 
down to the customary and polite. His illustrations are poetry 
and his jests illustrations. Socrates’ profession of obstetric 
art is good philosophy; and his finding that word “cookery,” 
and “adulatory art,” for rhetoric, in the Gorgias, 86 does us a 
substantial service still. No orator can measure in effect 
with him who can give good nicknames. 


38 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


What moderation and understatement and checking his 
thunder in mid volley! He has good-naturedly furnished the 
courtier and citizen with all that can be said against the 
schools. “For philosophy is an elegant thing, if any one 
modestly meddles with it; but if he is conversant with it 
more than is becoming, it corrupts the man.” He could well 
afford to be generous, — he, who from the sunlike centrality 
and reach of his vision, had a faith without cloud. Such as 
his perception, was his speech: he plays with the doubt and 
makes the most of it: he paints and quibbles; and by and by 
comes a sentence that moves the sea and land. The admirable 
earnest comes not only at intervals, in the perfect yes and no 
of the dialogue, but in bursts of light. “I, therefore, Calli- 
cles, 86 am persuaded by these accounts, and consider how I 
may exhibit my soul before the judge in a healthy condition. 
Wherefore, disregarding the honors that most men value, and 
looking to the truth, I shall endeavor in reality to live as 
virtuously as I can; and when I die, to die so. And I invite 
all other men, to the utmost of my power; and you too I in 
turn invite to this contest, which, I affirm, surpasses all 
contests here.” 

He is a great average man; one who, to the best thinking, 
adds a proportion and equality in his faculties, so that men 
see in him their own dreams and glimpses made available and 
made to pass for what they are. A great common-sense is his 
warrant and qualification to be the world’s interpreter. He 
has reason, as all the philosophic and poetic class have: but 
he has also what they have not, — this strong solving sense to 
reconcile his poetry with the appearances of the world, and 
build a bridge from the streets of cities to the Atlantis. 87 He 
omits never this graduation, but slopes his thought, however 
picturesque the precipice on one side, to an access from the 
plain. He never writes in ecstasy, or catches us up into poetic 
raptures. 

Plato apprehended the cardinal facts. He could prostrate 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 


39 


himself on the earth and cover his eyes whilst he adored that 
which cannot be numbered, or gauged, or known, or named: 
that of which every thing can be affirmed and denied: that 
“which is entity and nonentity.” He called it super-essential. 
He even stood ready, as in the Parmenides, 88 to demonstrate 
that it was so, — that this Being exceeded the limits of 
intellect. No man ever more fully acknowledged the In¬ 
effable. Having paid his homage, as for the human race, to 
the Illimitable, he then stood erect, and for the human race 
affirmed, “And yet things are knowable!”— that is, the 
Asia in his mind was first heartily honored, — the ocean of 
love and power, before form, before will, before knowledge, 
the Same, the Good, the One; and now, refreshed and em¬ 
powered by this worship, the instinct of Europe, namely, 
culture, returns; and he cries, “Yet things are knowable!” 
They are knowable, because being from one, things corres¬ 
pond. /There is a scale; and the correspondence of heaven 
to eartnTof matter to mind, of the part to the whole, is our 
guide. As there is a science of stars, called astronomy; a' 
science of quantities, called mathematics; a science of quali¬ 
ties, called chemistry; so there is a science of sciences, — I 
call it Dialectic, 89 — which is the Intellect discriminating the 
false and the true. It rests on the observation of identity and 
diversity; for to judge is to unite to an object the notion 
which belongs to it. The sciences, even the best, — mathe¬ 
matics and astronomy, — are like sportsmen, who seize 
whatever prey offers, even without being able to make any 
use of it. Dialectic must teach the use of them. “This is of 
that rank that no intellectual man will enter on any study 
for its own sake, but only with a view to advance himself in 
that one sole science which embraces all.” 

“The essence or peculiarity of man is to comprehend a 
whole; or that which in the diversity of sensations can be 
comprised under a rational unity.” “The soul which has never 
perceived the truth, cannot pass into the human form.” I 


4 o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


announce to men the Intellect. I announce the good of being 
interpenetrated by the mind that made nature: this benefit, 
namely, that it can understand nature, which it made and 
maketh. Nature is good, but intellect is better: as the law¬ 
giver is before the law-receiver. I give you joy, O sons of 
men! that truth is altogether wholesome; that we have hope 
to search out what might be the very self of everything. 
The misery of man is to be baulked of the sight of essence 
and to be stuffed with conjectures; but the supreme good is 
reality; the supreme beauty is reality; and all virtue and all 
felicity depend on this science of the real: for courage is 
nothing else than knowledge; the fairest fortune that can be¬ 
fall man is to be guided by his daemon 90 to that which is 
truly his own. This also is the essence of justice, — to attend 
every one his own: nay, the notion of virtue is not to be ar¬ 
rived at except through direct contemplation of the divine 
essence. Courage then! for “the persuasion that we must 
search that which we do not know, will render us, beyond 
•comparison, better, braver, and more industrious than if we 
thought it impossible to discover what we do not know, and 
useless to search for it.’’ He secures a position not to be 
commanded, by his passion for reality; valuing philosophy 
only as it is the pleasure of conversing with real being. 

Thus, full of the genius of Europe, he said, Culture. He 
saw the institutions of Sparta 91 and recognized, more genially 
one would say than any since, the hope of education. He 
delighted in every accomplishment, in every graceful and 
useful and truthful performance; above all in the splendors 
of genius and intellectual achievement. “The whole of life, 
O Socrates,’’ said Glauco, 92 “is, with the wise, the measure of 
hearing such discourses as these.” What a price he sets on 
the feats of talent, on the powers of Pericles, of Isocrates, 93 
of Parmenides! 94 What price above price on the talents 
themselves! He called the several faculties, gods, in his 
beautiful personation. What value he gives to the art of 


4i 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

gymnastic in education; what to geometry; what to music; 
what to astronomy, whose appeasing and medicinal power he 
celebrates! In the Timaeus 95 he indicates the highest employ¬ 
ment of the eyes. “By us it is asserted that God invented 
and bestowed sight on us for this purpose, — that on survey¬ 
ing the circles of intelligence in the heavens, we might properly 
employ those of our own minds, which, though disturbed 
when compared with the others that are uniform, are still 
allied to their circulations; and that having thus learned, 
and being naturally possessed of a correct reasoning faculty, 
we might, by imitating the uniform revolutions of divinity, 
set right our own wanderings and blunders.” And in the 
Republic, — “By each of these disciplines a certain organ of 
the soul is both purified and reanimated which is blinded 
and buried by studies of another kind; an organ better worth 
saving than ten thousand eyes, since truth is perceived by 
this alone.” 

He said, Culture; but he first admitted its basis, and gave 
immeasurably the first place to advantages of nature. His 
patrician tastes laid stress on the distinctions of birth. In 
the doctrine of the organic character and disposition is the 
origin of caste. “Such as were fit to govern, into their com¬ 
position the informing Deity mingled gold; into the military, 
silver; iron and brass for husbandmen and artificers.” The 
East confirms itself, in all ages, in this faith. The Koran is 
explicit on this point of caste. “Men have their metal, as of 
gold and silver. Those of you who were the worthy ones in 
the state of ignorance, will be the worthy ones in the state 
of faith, as soon as you embrace it.” Plato was not less firm. 
“Of the five orders of things, only four can be taught to the 
generality of men.” In the Republic he insists on the tem¬ 
peraments of the youth, as first of the first. 

A happier example of the stress laid on nature is in the 
dialogue with the young Theages, 96 who wishes to receive 
lessons from Socrates. Socrates declares that if some have 


42 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


grown wise by associating with him, no thanks are due to 
him; but, simply, whilst they were with him they grew 
wise, not because of him; he pretends not to know the way 
of it. “It is adverse to many, nor can those be benefited by 
associating with me whom the Daemon opposes; so that it is 
not possible for me to live with these. With many, however, 
he does not prevent me from conversing, who yet are not at 
all benefited by associating with me. Such, O Theages, is the 
association with me; for, if it pleases the God, you will make 
great and rapid proficiency: you will not, if he does not 
please. Judge whether it is not safer to be instructed by some 
one of those who have power over the benefit which they 
impart to men, than by me, who benefit or not, just as it may 
happen.” As if he had said, “ I have no system. I cannot be 
answerable for you. You will be what you must. If there is 
love between us, inconceivably delicious and profitable will 
our intercourse be; if not, your time is lost and you will only 
annoy me. I shall seem to you stupid, and the reputation 
I have, false. Quite above us, beyond the will of you or me, 
is this secret affinity or repulsion laid. All my good is mag¬ 
netic, and I educate, not by lessons, but by going about my 
business.” 

He said, Culture; he said, Nature; and he failed not to 
add, “There is also the divine.” There is no thought in any 
mind but it quickly tends to convert itself into a power and 
organizes a huge instrumentality of means. Plato, lover of 
limits, loved the illimitable, saw the enlargement and no¬ 
bility which come from truth itself and good itself, and at¬ 
tempted as if on the part of the human intellect, once for 
all to do it adequate homage, — homage fit for the immense 
soul to receive, and yet homage becoming the intellect to 
render. He said then, “Our faculties run out into infinity, 
and return to us thence. We can define but a little way; 
but here is a fact which will not be skipped, and which to shut 
our eyes upon is suicide. All things are in a scale; and, begin 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 


43 


where we will, ascend and ascend. All things are symbolical; 
and what we call results are beginnings.” 

A key to the method and completeness of Plato is his twice 
bisected line. After he has illustrated the relation between 
the absolute good and true and the forms of the intelligible 
world, he says: — “Let there be a line cut in two unequal 
parts. Cut again each of these two main parts, — one repre¬ 
senting the visible, the other the intelligible world, 1 — and let 
these two new sections represent the bright part and the dark 
part, of each of these worlds. You will have, for one of the 
sections of the visible world, images, that is, both shadows 
and reflections; — for the other section, the objects of these 
images, that is, plants, animals, and the works of art and 
nature. Then divide the intelligible world in like manner; 
the one section will be of opinions and hypotheses, and the 
other section of truths.” To these four sections, the four 
operations of the soul correspond, — conjecture, faith, under¬ 
standing, reason. As every pool reflects the image of the 
sun, so every thought and thing restores us an image and 
creature of the supreme Good. The universe is perforated 
by a million channels for his activity. All things mount and 
mount. 

All his thought has this ascension; in Phsedrus, 97 teaching 
that beauty is the most lovely of all things, exciting hilarity 
and shedding desire and confidence through the universe 
wherever it enters, and it enters in some degree into all 
things: —but that there is another, which is as much more 
beautiful than beauty as beauty is than chaos; namely, wisdom, 
which our wonderful (organ of sight cannot reach unto, but 
which, could it be seen, would ravish us with its perfect 
reality. He has the same regard to it as the source of 
excellence in works of art. When an artificer, he says, in the 
fabrication of any work, looks to that which always subsists 
according to the same; and, employing a model of this kind, 
expresses its idea and power in his work, — it must follow 


44 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


that his production should be beautiful. But when he beholds 
that which is born and dies, it will be far from beautiful. 

Thus ever: the Banquet 98 is a teaching in the same spirit, 
familiar now to all the poetry and to all the sermons of the 
world, that the love of the sexes is initial, and symbolizes at a 
distance the passion of the soul for that immense lake of 
beauty it exists to seek. [This faith in the Divinity is never 
out of mind, and constitutes the ground of all his dogmas. 
Body cannot teach wisdom; — God only. In the same mind 
he constantly affirms that virtue cannot be taught; that it is 
not a science, but an inspiration; that the greatest goods are 
produced to us through mania and are assigned to us by a 
divine giftj 

This leads me to that central figure which he has estab¬ 
lished in his Academy as the organ through which every con¬ 
sidered opinion shall be announced, and whose biography 
he has likewise so labored that the historic facts are lost in 
the light of Plato’s mind. Socrates and Plato are the double 
star which the most powerful instruments will not entirely 
separate. Socrates again, in his traits and genius, is the best 
example of that synthesis which constitutes Plato’s extra¬ 
ordinary power. Socrates, a man of humble stem, but honest 
enough; of the commonest history; of a personal homeli¬ 
ness so remarkable as to be a cause of wit in others: — the 
rather that his broad good nature and exquisite taste for a 
joke invited the sally, which was sure to be paid. The play¬ 
ers personated him on the stage; 99 the potters copied his 
ugly face on their stone jugs. He was a cool fellow, adding to 
his humor a perfect temper and a knowledge of his man, be he 
who he might whom he talked with, which laid the com¬ 
panion open to certain defeat in any debate, — and in debate 
he immoderately delighted. The young men are prodigiously 
fond of him and invite him to their feasts, whither he goes for 
conversation. He can drink, too; has the strongest head in 
Athens; and after leaving the whole party under the table, 



45 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

goes away as if nothing had happened, to begin new dialogues 
with somebody that is sober. In short, he was what our coun¬ 
try-people call an old one. 

He affected a good many citizen-like tastes, was monstrously 
fond of Athens, hated trees, never willingly went beyond the 
walls, knew the old characters, valued the bores and philis- 
tines, thought every thing in Athens a little better than 
anything in any other place. He was plain as a Quaker in 
habit and speech , 100 affected low phrases, and illustrations 
from cocks and quails, soup-pans and sycamore-spoons, 
grooms and farriers, and unnameable offices, — especially if 
he talked with any superfine person. He had a Franklin-like 
wisdom. Thus he showed one who was afraid to go on foot 
to Olympia, that it was no more than his daily walk within 
doors, if continuously extended, would easily reach. 

Plain old uncle as he was, with his great ears, an immense 
talker, — the rumor ran that on one or two occasions, in the 
war with Boeotia , 101 he had shown a determination which had 
covered the retreat of a troop; and there was some story 
that under cover of folly, he had, in the city government, 
when one day he chanced to hold a seat there, evinced a 
courage in opposing singly the popular voice, which had well- 
nigh ruined him. He is very poor; but then he is hardy as a 
soldier, and can live on a few olives; usually, in the strictest 
sense, on bread and water, except when entertained by his 
friends. His necessary expenses were exceedingly small, 
and no one could live as he did. He wore no under garment; 
his upper garment was the same for summer and winter, 
and he went barefooted; and it is said that to procure the 
pleasure, which he loved, of talking at his ease all day with 
the most elegant and cultivated young men, he will now and 
then return to his shop and carve statues, good or bad, for 
sale. However that be, it is certain that he had grown to 
delight in nothing else than this conversation; and that, 
under his hypocritical pretence of knowing nothing, he attacks 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


46 

and brings down all the fine speakers, all the fine philosophers 
of Athens, whether natives or strangers from Asia Minor and 
the islands. Nobody can refuse to talk with him, he is so 
honest and really curious to know; a man who was willingly 
confuted if he did not speak the truth, and who willingly 
confuted others asserting what was false; and not less pleased 
when confuted than when confuting; for he thought not any 
evil happened to men of such a magnitude as false opinion 
respecting the just and unjust. A pitiless disputant, who 
knows nothing, but the bounds of whose conquering intelli¬ 
gence no man had ever reached; whose temper was imper¬ 
turbable; whose dreadful logic was always leisurely and 
sportive; so careless and ignorant as to disarm the wariest and 
draw them, in the pleasantest manner, into horrible doubts 
and confusion. But he always knew the way out; knew it, 
yet would not tell it. No escape; he drives them to terrible 
choices by his dilemmas, and tosses the Hippiases and Gorgi- 
ases 102 with their grand reputations, as a boy tosses his balls. 
The tyrannous realist! — Meno 103 has discoursed a thousand 
times, at length, on virtue, before many companies, and very 
well, as it appeared to him; but at this moment he cannot 
even tell what it is, — this cramp-fish 104 of a Socrates has so 
bewitched him. 

This hard-headed humorist, whose strange conceits, droll¬ 
ery, and bonhommie 105 diverted the young patricians, whilst 
the rumor of his sayings and quibbles gets abroad every 
day, — turns out, in the sequel, to have a probity as in¬ 
vincible as his logic, and to be either insane, or at least, under 
cover of this play, enthusiastic in his religion . 106 When ac¬ 
cused before the judges of subverting the popular creed, he 
affirms the immortality of the soul, the future reward and 
punishment; and refusing to recant, in a caprice of the 
popular government was condemned to die, and sent to the 
prison. Socrates entered the prison and took away all ig¬ 
nominy from the place, which could not be a prison whilst 


47 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

he was there. Crito 107 bribed the jailer; but Socrates would 
not go out by treachery. “Whatever inconvenience ensue, 
nothing is to be preferred before justice. These things I hear 
like pipes and drums, whose sound makes me deaf to every 
thing you say.” The fame of this prison, the fame of the 
discourses there and the drinking of the hemlock 108 are one 
of the most precious passages in the history of the world. 

The rare coincidence, in one ugly body, of the droll and the 
martyr, the keen street and market debater with the sweetest 
saint known to any history at that time, had forcibly struck 
the mind of Plato, so capacious of these contrasts; and the 
figure of Socrates by a necessity placed itself in the foreground 
of the scene, as the fittest dispenser of the intellectual treas¬ 
ures he had to communicate. It was a rare fortune that this 
HLsop 109 of the mob and this robed scholar should meet, to 
make each other immortal in their mutual faculty. The 
strange synthesis in the character of Socrates capped the 
synthesis in the mind of Plato. Moreover by this means he 
was able, in the direct way and without envy to avail himself 
of the wit and weight of Socrates, to which unquestionably 
his own debt was great; and these derived again their prin¬ 
cipal advantage from the perfect art of Plato. 

It remains to say that the defect of Plato in power is only 
that which results inevitably from his quality. He is in¬ 
tellectual in his aim; and therefore, in expression, literary. 
Mounting into heaven, diving into the pit, expounding the 
laws of the state, the passion of love, the remorse of crime, the 
hope of the parting soul, — he is literary, and never otherwise. 
It is almost the sole deduction from the merit of Plato that his 
writings have not, — what is no doubt incident to this 
regnancy 110 of intellect in his work, — the vital authority 
which the screams of prophets and the sermons of unlettered 
Arabs and Jews possess. There is an interval; and to co¬ 
hesion, contact is necessary. 

I know not what can be said in reply to this criticism but 


48 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


that we have come to a fact in the nature of things: an oak 
is not an orange. The qualities of sugar remain with sugar, 
and those of salt with salt. 

In the second place, he has not a system. The dearest 
defenders and disciples are at fault. He attempted a theory 
of the universe, and his theory is not complete or self-evident. 
One man thinks he means this, and another that; he has said 
one thing in one place, and the reverse of it in another place. 
He is charged with having failed to make the transition from 
ideas to matter. Here is the world, sound as a nut, perfect, 
not the smallest piece of chaos 111 left, never a stitch nor an 
end, not a mark of haste, or botching, or second thought; 
but the theory of the world is a thing of shreds and patches. 

The longest wave is quickly lost in the sea. Plato would 
willingly have a Platonism, a known and accurate expression 
for the world, and it should be accurate. It shall be the world 
passed through the mind of Plato, — nothing less. Every 
atom shall have the Platonic tinge; every atom, every re¬ 
lation or quality you knew before, you shall know again and 
find here, but now ordered; not nature, but art. And you 
shall feel that Alexander 112 indeed overran, with men and 
horses, some countries of the planet; but countries, and things 
of which countries are made, elements, planet itself, laws of 
planet and of men, have passed through this man as bread 
into his body, and become no longer bread, but body: so all 
this mammoth morsel has become Plato. He has clapped 
copyright on the world. This is the ambition of individualism. 
But the mouthful proves too large. Boa constrictor has good 
will to eat it, but he is foiled. He falls abroad in the attempt; 
and biting, gets strangled: the bitten world holds the biter 
fast by his own teeth. There he perishes: unconquered na¬ 
ture lives on and forgets him. So it fares with all: so must it 
fare with Plato. In view of eternal nature, Plato turns out to 
be philosophical exercitations. He argues on this side and 
on that. The acutest German, the lovingest disciple, could 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 


49 

never tell what Platonism was; indeed, admirable texts can 
be quoted on both sides of every great question from him. 

'^These things we are forced to say if we must consider the 
effort of Plato or of any philosopher to dispose of nature, —( 
which will not be disposed of. No power of genius has ever 
yet had the smallest success in explaining existence. The 
perfect enigma remains. But there is an injustice in assuming 
this ambition for Plato. Let us not seem to treat with flip¬ 
pancy his venerable name. Men, in proportion to their intel¬ 
lect, have admitted his transcendent claims. The way to know 
him is to compare him, not with nature, but with other men. 
How many ages have gone by, and he remains unapproached! 
A chief structure of human wit, like Karnac , 113 or the mediaeval 
cathedrals, or the Etrurian 114 remains, it requires all the 
breath of human faculty to know it. I think it is trueliest 
seen when seen with the utmost respect. His sense deepens, 
his merits multiply, with study. When we say, “Here is a 
fine collection of fables”; or when we praise the style, or the 
common sense, or arithmetic, we speak as boys, and much of 
our impatient criticism of the dialectic, I suspect, is no better. 

The criticism is like our impatience of miles, when we are 
in a hurry; but it is still best that a mile should have seven¬ 
teen hundred and sixty yards. The great-eyed Plato pro¬ 
portioned the lights and shades after the genius of our life. 


Plato: New Readings 

The publication, in Mr. Bohn’s “Serial Library,” of the 
excellent translations of Plato, which we esteem one of the 
chief benefits the cheap press has yielded, gives us an occa¬ 
sion to take hastily a few more notes of the elevation and 
bearings of this fixed star; or to add a bulletin, like the 
journals, of Plato at the latest dates. 

Modern science, by the extent of its generalization, has 
learned to indemnify the student of man for the defects of 




50 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


individuals by tracing growth and ascent in races; and, by 
the simple expedient of lighting up the vast background, 
generates a feeling of complacency and hope. The human 
being has the saurian 115 and the plant in his rear. His arts 
and sciences, the easy issue of his brain, look glorious when 
prospectively beheld from the distant brain of ox, crocodile, 
and fish. It seems as if nature, in regarding the geologic 
night behind her, when, in five or six millenniums, she had 
turned out five or six men, as Homer, Phidias , 116 Menu , 117 and 
Columbus, was no wise discontented with the result. These 
samples attested the virtue of the tree. These were a clear 
amelioration of trilobite 118 and saurus , 119 and a good basis 
for further proceeding. With this artist, time and space are 
cheap, and she is insensible to what you say of tedious prepara¬ 
tion. She waited tranquilly the flowing periods of paleon¬ 
tology, for the hour to be struck when man should arrive. 
Then periods must pass before the motion of the earth can be 
suspected; then before the map of the instincts and the culti¬ 
vable powers can be drawn. But as of races, so the succession 
of individual men is fatal and beautiful, and Plato has the 
fortune in the history of mankind to mark an epoch. 

Plato’s fame does not stand on a syllogism, or on any 
masterpieces of the Socratic reasoning, or on any thesis, as 
for example the immortality of the soul. He is more than an 
expert, or a school-man, or a geometer, or the prophet of a 
peculiar message. j^HeT represents the privilege of the intellect, 
the power, namely, of carrying up every fact to successive 
platforms and so disclosing in every fact a germ of expansion. 
These expansions are in the essence of thought. The natural¬ 
ist would never help us to them by any discoveries of the ex¬ 
tent of the universe, but is as poor when cataloguing the 
resolved nebula of Orion , 120 as when measuring the angles of 
an acre. But the Republic of Plato, by these expansions, 
may be said to require and so to anticipate the astronomy of 
Laplace . 121 The expansions are organic. The mind does not 


5i 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

create what it perceives, any more than the eye creates the 
rose. In ascribing to Plato the merit of announcing them, 
we only say, “Here was a more complete man, who could 
apply to nature the whole scale of the senses, the under¬ 
standing and the reason.” These expansions or extensions 
consist in continuing the spiritual sight where the horizon 
falls on our natural vision, and by this second sight discover¬ 
ing the long lines of law which shoot in every direction^ 
Everywhere he stands on a path which has no end, but runs 
continuously round the universe. Therefore every word 
becomes an exponent of nature. Whatever he looks upon 
discloses a second sense, and ulterior senses. His perception 
of the generation of contraries, of death out of life and life 
out of death, — that law by which, in nature, decompo¬ 
sition is recomposition, and putrefaction and cholera are 
only signals of a new creation; his discernment of the little 
in the large and the large in the small; studying the state 
in the citizen and the citizen in the state; and leaving it 
doubtful whether he exhibited the Republic as an allegory 
on the education of the private soul; his beautiful defini¬ 
tions of ideas, of time, of form, of figure, of the line, some¬ 
times hypothetically given, as his defining of virtue, courage, 
justice, temperance; his love of the apologue, and his apo¬ 
logues themselves; the cave of Trophonius ; 122 the ring of 
Gyges ; 123 the charioteer and two horses ; 124 the golden, 
silver, brass, and iron temperaments ; 125 Theuth and Tha- 
mus ; 126 and the visions of Hades and the Fates, — fables 
which have imprinted themselves in the human memory like 
the signs of the zodiac; his soliform eye 127 and his boniform 
soul ; 128 his doctrine of assimilation; his doctrine of reminis¬ 
cence ; his clear vision of the laws of return, or reaction, which 
secure instant justice throughout the universe, instanced 
everywhere, but specially in the doctrine, “what comes from 
God to us, returns from us to God,” and in Socrates’ belief 
that the laws below are sisters of the laws above. 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


52 

More striking examples are his moral conclusions. Plato 
affirms the coincidence of science and virtue; for vice can 
never know itself and virtue, but virtue knows both itself and 
vice. The eye attested that justice was best, as long as it was 
profitable; Plato affirms that it is profitable throughout; that 
the profit is intrinsic, though the just conceal his justice from 
gods and men; that it is better to suffer injustice than to do 
it; that the sinner ought to covet punishment; that the lie 
was more hurtful than homicide; and that ignorance, or the 
involuntary lie, was more calamitous than involuntary 
homicide; that the soul is unwillingly deprived of true opin- 
. ions, and that no man sins willingly; that the order or pro¬ 
ceeding of nature was from the mind to the body, and, though 
a sound body cannot restore an unsound mind, yet a good 
soul can, by its virtue, render the body the best possible. 
The intelligent have a right over the ignorant, namely, 
the right of instructing them. The right punishment of one 
out of tune is to make him play in tune; the fine which the 
good, refusing to govern, ought to pay, is, to be governed by a 
worse man; that his guards shall not handle gold and silver, 
but shall be instructed that there is gold and silver in their 
souls, which will make men willing to give them every thing 
which they need. 

This second sight explains the stress laid on geometry. 
He saw that the globe of earth was not more lawful and precise 
than was the super-sensible; that a celestial geometry was in 
place there, as a logic of lines and angles here below; that the 
world was throughout mathematical; the proportions are 
constant of oxygen, azote , 129 and lime; there is just so much 
water and slate and magnesia; not less are the proportions 
constant of the moral elements. 

This eldest Goethe , 130 hating varnish and falsehood, de¬ 
lighted in revealing the real at the base of the accidental; in 
discovering connection, continuity, and representation every¬ 
where, hating insulation; and appears like the god of wealth 



53 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

among the cabins of vagabonds, opening power and capa¬ 
bility in everything he touches. Ethical science was new and 
vacant when Plato could write thus: — “Of all whose argu¬ 
ments are left to the men of the present time, no one has ever 
yet condemned injustice, or praised justice, otherwise than 
as respects the repute, honors, and emoluments arising there¬ 
from ; while, as respects either of them in itself, and subsisting 
by its own power in the soul of the possessor, and concealed 
both from gods and men, no one has yet sufficiently investi¬ 
gated, either in poetry or prose writings, — how, namely, 
that injustice is the greatest of all the evils that the soul has 
within it, and justice the greatest good.” 

His definition of ideas, as what is simple, permanent, uni¬ 
form, and self-existent, forever discriminating them from the 
notions of the understanding, marks an era in the world. He 
was born to behold the self-evolving power of spirit, endless, 
generator of new ends; a power which is the key at once to the 
centrality and the evanescence of things. Plato is so centred 
that he can well spare all his dogmas. Thus the fact of knowl¬ 
edge and ideas reveals to him the fact of eternity; and the 
doctrine of reminiscence he offers as the most probable 
particular explication. Call that fanciful, — it matters 
not: the connection between our knowledge and the abyss 
of being is still real, and the explication must be not less mag¬ 
nificent. 

He has indicated every eminent point in speculation. He 
wrote on the scale of the mind itself, so that all things have 
symmetry in his tablet. He put in all the past, without weari¬ 
ness, and descended into detail with a courage like that he 
witnessed in nature. One would say that his forerunners had 
mapped out each a farm or a district or an island, in intellec¬ 
tual geography, but that Plato first drew the sphere. He do¬ 
mesticates the soul in nature: man is the microcosm. All the 
circles of the visible heaven represent as many circles in the 
rational soul. There is no lawless particle, and there is 


54 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


nothing casual in the action of the human mind. The names 
of things, too, are fatal, following the nature of things. All 
the gods of the Pantheon 131 are, by their names, significant of a 
profound sense. The gods are the ideas. Pan 132 is speech, or 
manifestation; Saturn , 133 the contemplative; Jove , 134 the 
regal soul; and Mars , 135 passion. Venus 136 is proportion; 
Calliope , 137 the soul of the world; Aglaia , 138 intellectual 
illustration. 

These thoughts, in sparkles of light, had appeared often to 
pious and to poetic souls; but this well-bred, all-knowing 
Greek geometer comes with command, gathers them all up 
into rank and gradation, the Euclid of holiness, and marries 
the two parts of nature. Before all men, he saw the intellec¬ 
tual values of the moral sentiment. He describes his own 
ideal, when he paints, in Timaeus, a god leading things from 
disorder into order. He kindled a fire so truly in the centre 
that we see the sphere illuminated, and can distinguish poles, 
equator, and lines of latitude, every arc and node : 139 a theory 
so averaged, so modulated, that you would say the winds of 
ages had swept through this rhythmic structure, and not that 
^it was the brief extempore blotting of one short-lived scribe. 
Hence it has happened that a very well-marked class of souls, 
namely those who delight in giving a spiritual, that is, an 
ethico-intellectual expression to every truth, by exhibiting an 
ulterior end which is yet legitimate to it, — are said to 
Y^atonize. Thus, Michael Angelo 140 is a Platonist in his 
sonnets: Shakespeare is a Platonist when he writes, — 

“Nature is made better by no mean , 141 
But nature makes that mean,” 

or, — 

“He, that can endure 142 
To follow with allegiance a fallen lord, 

Does conquer him that did his master conquer, 

And earns a place in the story.” 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 


55 


Hamlet is a pure Platonist, and ’t is the magnitude only of 
Shakspeare’s proper genius that hinders him from being 
classed as the most eminent of this school. Swedenborg, 
throughout his prose poem of “Conjugal Love,” is a Plato¬ 
nist. 

His subtlety commended him to men of thought. The 
secret of his popular success is the moral aim which endeared 
him to mankind. “ Intellect,” he said, “is king of heaven and 
of earth;” but in Plato, intellect is always moral. His writ¬ 
ings have also the sempiternal 143 youth of poetry. For their 
arguments, most of them, might have been couched in sonnets: 
and poetry has never soared higher than in the Timaeus and 
the Phaedrus. As the poet, too, he is only contemplative. He 
did not, like Pythagoras, break himself with an institution. 
All his painting in the Republic must be esteemed mythical, 
with intent to bring out, sometimes in violent colors, his 
thought. You cannot institute, without peril of charlatan¬ 
ism. 

It was a high scheme, his absolute privilege for the best 
(which, to make emphatic, he expressed by community of 
women), as the premium which he would set on grandeur. 
There shall be exempts of two kinds: first, those who by 
demerit have put themselves below protection,—outlaws; 
and secondly, those who by eminence of nature and desert 
are out of the reach of your rewards. Let such be free of the 
city and above the law. We confide them to themselves; let 
them do with us as they will. Let none presume to measure 
the irregularites of Michael Angelo and Socrates by village 
scales. 

In his eighth book of the Republic, he throws a little mathe¬ 
matical dust in our eyes. I am sorry to see him, after such 
noble superiorities, permitting the lie to governors. Plato 
plays Providence a little with the baser sort, as people allow 
themselves with their dogs.and cats. 


56 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


NOTES 

1 The second caliph or successor to Mohammed. He con¬ 
quered Syria and Palestine and built the magnificent mosque 
which bears his name on the site of Solomon’s temple. 

2 The sacred book of the Mohammedans, supposed to have 
been received as a message from Allah and transcribed on shells. 

3 “The science of being or reality; the branch of knowledge 
that investigates the nature, essential properties, and relations of 
being, as such.” Webster’s New International Dictionary. 

4 Roman philosopher and statesman ( ca . 473-ca. 525). 

5 Rabelais , Frangois, French doctor, philosopher, and writer 
of satiric and humorous narratives; e.g., Gargantua and Panta- 
gruel (ca. 1490-1553). 

6 Erasmus , Desiderius, famous scholar; born in Holland, edu¬ 
cated in Germany and Italy; teacher of Greek at Oxford; leader 
in so-called Humanistic Movement (ca. 1466-1536). 

7 Bruno, Filippo Giordano, Italian philosopher and scientist 
(1540-1600). 

8 Locke , John, English philosopher (1632-1704). 

9 Rousseau, Jean Jacques, French philosopher, novelist, es¬ 
sayist, forerunner of the Romantic Movement in literature 
(1712-1778). 

10 Alfieri, Count Vittorio Amadeo, Italian dramatist (17*49- 
1803). 

11 Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, English essayist, philosopher, poet 
(1772-1834). 

12 Dialect. 

13 There were two St. Augustines, and they are often popularly 
confused. One was the early missionary to southern England, of 
the late sixth century; the other, the one no doubt mentioned by 
Emerson, was one of the saints of the early Christian Church and 
remembered for his Confessions (354-430). 

14 Copernicus, Nikolaus, Polish astronomer. Founder of hhe 
modern system of astronomy (1473-1543). 

15 Newton, Sir Isaac, English philosopher and mathematician, 
famous for his Laws of Gravitation (1642-1727). 

16 Behmen, Jakob (or Bcehme, or Bohme). German cobbler- 
philosopher, a mystic. His ideas were similar to those held by the 
Society of Friends or Quakers (1575-1624). 

17 Swedenborg. See “Uses of Great Men,” Note II. 

18 Goethe. See “Uses of Great Men,” Note 48. 

19 Used here for all Germanic peoples of northern Europe. 

20 Used of the Mediterranean peoples in contrast to the 
Teutonic tribes of the north. 

21 Referring to a famous school of literature, science, and philos¬ 
ophy at Alexandria during the last three centuries b.c. 


57 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 

22 Referring to the English people during the Renaissance. 

23 English philosopher, friend of Henry VIII, a leader in the 
Humanist Movement in the Renaissance, a martyr to his po¬ 
litical convictions. Most noted work, the Utopia (1487-1535). 

24 English philosopher and divine (1614-1687). 

25 English clergyman and writer (1584-1656). 

26 Among the many distinguished men of this name probably 
the one in Emerson’s mind at this point was the learned English 
divine, editor of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History (1659-1715). 

27 Lord Bacon , Francis, Baron Verulam, Viscount of St. 
Albans, English philosopher, statesman, scientist. Credited with 
the introduction of the inductive method of research (1561-1626). 

28 English bishop and writer (1613-1667). 

29 Ralph Cudworth , English clergyman and philosopher (1617- 
1688). 

30 Sydenham , Thomas, English physician (1624-1689). 

31 Thomas Taylor , English scholar, noted for his classical 
translations (1758-1835). 

32 Marcilius Ficinus (Ficino, Marcilio), Italian philosopher of 
the Platonistic school (1433-1499). 

33 Picus Mirandola, Giovanni (usually known as Pico della 
Mirandola), Italian scholar, leader of the Humanist Movement 
(1463-1494). 

34 The religious principles of John Calvin, French reformer 
(1509-1564), the leading tenets of which include infant baptism, 
predestination, foreordination, election, etc. Calvin brought 
Protestantism to France and Switzerland. 

35 In this work Plato deals with the doctrines of immortality 
and preexistence as from the mouth of the dying Socrates. 

36 (Akhlag-i-Jalalf) A Persian work on ethics, written in the 
second half of the fifteenth century. 

37 The belief in direct communion of the individual with God 
through inward perceptions of the mind or soul. Held by such 
men as Augustine, Francis of Assisi, Swedenborg, and practiced 
by such sects as the Waldensians, Catheri, Quakers. 

38 Daughter of Zeus and Leda, wife of Menelaos, king of 
Sparta, whose elopement with Paris, son of Priam, king of Troy, 
caused the Trojan War. Typical of beauty in women. 

39 Supposed author of the Greek epics, Iliad and Odyssey , 
about the ninth century b.c. 

40 Raffcelle, (Raphael Sanzio), eminent painter of the Italian 

Renaissance (1483-1520). # f 

41 Using other authors’ words, thoughts, and ideas as one’s 
own, without credit. 

42 The great lawgiver of Athens ( ca . 638 -ca. 558 B.C.). 

43 A comic poet of Syracuse whose works pleased Plato, fifth 
century b.c. 

44 Pythagorean philosopher of Crotona, fourth century B.C.; 


58 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 1 

a forerunner of Copernicus in the belief in the diurnal motion of 
the earth and its annual motion round the sun. 

45 The Timseus referred to here was probably the Pythagorean 
philosopher of Locris. He wrote a treatise on the nature and the 
soul of the world. 

46 Heraclitus. A Greek philosopher of Ephesus, about 500 B.C., 
of melancholy mind, whose ideas were later adopted by the group 
known as the Stoics. 

47 Greek philosopher of Elis, who flourished about 505 B.C.; 
first to discover that the earth was round. 

48 Athenian philosopher whose ideas were so radical as to 
cause his execution by drinking of a poison made of hemlock sap. 
\ca. 469 - 399 )- 

49 Greek philosopher and founder of a group known as the 
Pythagoreans, which constituted a practical training school for 
citizenship (582- after 507 b.c.). 

60 Plato’s masterpiece, a political treatise setting forth the 
attributes of the perfect city. 

51 Abbreviation for ante christum (before Christ). 

62 Greek statesman and leader of life and culture at Athens 
during the golden age of Athenian supremacy ( ca. 490-429 b.c.). 

63 An ancient city of Achaia, capital of a district called Meg- 
aris, situated between Corinth and Athens. 

54 Probably Dion of Syracuse, revolutionary leader and adviser 
of Plato (ca. 408-353). 

65 Dionysius II succeeded his father as tyrant of Sicily and, 
by advice of Dion, his brother-in-law, invited Plato to his court. 
Plato advised him to lay aside the supreme power and lead the 
simple life. The tyrant was displeased and had Plato seized 
and sold as a slave. He also banished Dion, who collected some 
forces in Greece, came back, and deposed Dionysius 357 b.c. 

M A place near Athens surrounded by high trees and adorned 
with covered walks, belonging to Academus, from whom.the name 
is probably derived. Here Plato opened his school of philosophy. 

67 I.e., broad. 

68 A cycle, or series, of oriental stories, very ancient, which 
have been translated from the Arabic into almost all the languages 
of the civilized world. But very probably Emerson had in mind 
in this connection the Seven Sages of Greece: Solon of Athens, 
Chilo of Sparta, Thales of Miletus, Bias of Priene, Cleobulus of 
Lindos, Pittacos of Mitylene, Periander of Corinth. 

69 Those who take partial or one-sided views on any question. 

60 Used in the sense of ballyhoo or noisy advertising, a char¬ 
acteristic New England use. 

61 The four oldest sacred books of the Hindus, of unknown 
antiquity, the basis of Brahminism. They consist mainly of 
hymns and verses addressed to the gods. 

62 The tendency of matter to seek the center of a revolving 
body; the opposite of centrifugence. 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 59 

63 A sea god, son of Neptune or Oceanus, who had the gift of 
prophecy. He was very elusive, often assuming the form of some 
beast and gliding away to escape answering questions. 

64 A long philosophic discourse in the form of a dialogue be¬ 
tween Krishna and Arjuna, the two most important characters 
of the Hindu epic, the Maha-bharata, and interpolated in that 
work. 

65 The Puranos were a collection of eighteen books of the 
popular religious literature of India, written in Sanscrit. The 
Vishnu Purana is a discourse on the supreme deity of that name. 

66 One of the leading objects of worship in Hinduism, being 
that incarnation of Vishnu most popular throughout northern 
India. 

67 A name in Greek mythology for the lowest regions, where the 
sun never shone, the abode of the most impious and guilty of the 
dead. 

68 The traditional social system of India where an individual 
lives his life on the social plane to which his fathers belonged. 

69 Malthus, Thomas Robert, eminent English scholar and 
economist (1766-1834). 

70 By the displacement of hand workers through introduction 
of machinery. 

71 A very white marble, mined since earliest times from Mt. 
Pentelicus near Athens; similar to Parian marble, but finer 
grained. 

72 The once famous shipyards of Medford, Massachusetts. 

73 Lowell, Massachusetts, is still noted for its manufactures. 

74 The early name of Constantinople was Byzantium, noted 
for its art, architecture, and learning. 

75 The art galleries of the famous court which Louis XIV 
established in 1682; about twelves miles from Paris. 

76 The original method of local government practiced by the 
Puritan fathers in New England, still used in small towns. 

77 One of the Olympian gods who stood for manly youth and 
beauty; the patron of the fine arts, medicine, music, poetry, 
eloquence. 

78 Reference to story common to Plato, Pindar, St. Ambrose, 
and others whose future greatness was supposed to have been 
foretold by the settling of a swarm of bees on their lips as children. 

79 There were many coins or medals struck in honor of Jove, 
showing him in characteristic poses. Probably the significance 
here is in the fact that the upper side of the medal was ornamented 
and the under side gave its monetary value. 

80 Here, the act of putting things together. 

81 Bones of the wings. 

82 Refers to the passing of the soul at death into another body. 

83 The three Parcse or Fates: Clotho, who held the distaff; 
Lachesis, the spinner of the thread; and Atrophos, who cut it 
off; thus signifying birth, life, and death. 


6o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


84 An enchanter spoken of in Spenser’s Faerie Queene, Book III, 
Canto XI. 

85 In this work Plato defines rhetoric as the tool of Justice and 
asserts that the art of persuasion is the secret of power. Socrates 
is justified against the world. 

86 One of the characters in Plato’s dialogue, the Gorgias. 

87 A celebrated island mentioned by the ancients. Its situa¬ 
tion is unknown and even its existence is doubted by some writers. 

88 One of the dialogues of Plato. 

89 A philosophical term used by Plato in the following senses: 

(1) Discussion by dialogue as a method of scientific investigation, 

(2) The method of investigating the truth by analysis, (3) The 
science of ideas or of the nature and laws of being, — the higher 
metaphysics. 

90 A spiritual being holding a place between man and deities; 
a guardian spirit of less rank than a god. 

91 The rival state of Athens in ancient Greece, noted for austere 
simplicity and physical training. 

92 A kinsman of Plato; a character in Plato’s Republic. 

93 Athenian orator and teacher of rhetoric (436-338 B.C.). 

94 A Greek philosopher about 505 b.c. 

95 The name of one of Plato’s dialogues. 

96 The name of a dialogue early ascribed to Plato but probably 
not his work. 

97 The name of one of Plato’s dialogues. 

98 One of Plato’s dialogues was named the Symposium or 
“ Banquet.” 

99 Socrates, as in the Clouds of Aristophanes. 

100 That is, in dress and language. The Quakers practiced 
plainness because they thought decoration belied their truthful¬ 
ness. 

101 A country of Greece north of Attica. 

102 Hippias of Elis, a Greek sophist born ca. mid-fifth century 
B.c. Gorgias, a celebrated sophist and orator (ca. 507-400 b.c.). 

103 A character in Plato’s dialogue of that name. 

104 The torpedo fish. 

105 Kindness, good nature, free and easy manners, cordial 
benevolence. 

406 # An enthusiast is one who goes to emotional excesses in 
religion; sometimes called a “zealot.” 

107 A friend and disciple of Socrates, author of some dialogues 
on philosophy now lost. 

108 Hemlock was the poison used in putting Socrates to death. 

109 A Phrygian philosopher, originally a slave, famed for his 
fables; died 561 b.c. 

110 That is, sovereignty, superiority. 

411 The confused condition of matter before the creation of the 
universe. 


PLATO; OR, THE PHILOSOPHER 6t 

112 Alexander (the Great), king of Macedon. Celebrated 
conqueror (356-323 b.c.). 

113 A village in upper Egypt. It includes part of the ruins of 
ancient Thebes, among them the remains of the Temple of Am¬ 
mon, largest of known temples. 

114 Etruria was a celebrated country of Italy, west of the Tiber, 
conquered with great difficulty by the Romans. 

115 An inhabitant of the age of reptiles which flourished before 
the age of man. 

116 A celebrated sculptor of Athens; died 432 b.c. 

117 The son of Brahma, whose institutes form the basis of 
Indian civil and religious law. 

118 A fossil crustacean of the Palaeozoic period. 

119 An extinct reptile. 

< 120 A nebula is one of the masses of gaseous matter found in 
different portions of the heavens. The largest known nebula is the 
nebula of the constellation Orion. 

121 Laplace , Pierre Simon de, French astronomer and mathe¬ 
matician (1749-1827). 

122 A shrine at which sacrifices were made. Trophonius was a 
celebrated architect of Bceotia who built Apollo’s temple at 
Delphi. After his death, supposedly by earthquake, he was 
honored as a god at the cave where he was supposed to dwell. 

123 A ring supposed to render its wearer invisible. Gyges was 
a Lydian king of great wealth, seventh century B.c. 

124 Refers to a quotation from the Phcedrus. 

125 Refers to a quotation from the Republic. 

126 Refers to a story in the Phcedrus told by Socrates of the 
Egyptian god, Theuth, who invented letters and showed them to 
the Egyptian king, Thamus, also a god, who objected to them on 
the ground that they would be bad for the memory. 

127 Soliform, i.e., like the sun. 

128 Boniform, i.e., sensitive to moral excellence. 

129 The name given by Lavoisier to nitrogen, because the gas 
did not sustain life. Now rarely used. 

130 That is, Plato. 

131 An organized commonwealth of all the gods; name given to 
a temple in honor of all the gods. 

132 God of huntsmen, shepherds, country dwellers. 

133 King of the world and father of Jupiter, the chief of the 
gods. He was supposed to have been banished from Greece by 
his son and fled to Italy, where he ruled during the so-called 
golden age. 

134 Most powerful of all the gods of the ancients. 

135 God of war. 

136 Goddess of love and beauty. 

137 One of the Muses, who presided over eloquence and heroic 
poetry. 


62 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


138 One of the three Graces. 

139 Astronomical terms. Arc refers to the apparent arc de¬ 
scribed above or below the horizon by the sun or other celestial 
body. Node refers to either of the two points where the orbit of a 
planet intercepts the ecliptic. 

140 Michael Angelo , (Michelangelo), Buonarroti. Italian 
painter and sculptor, architect and poet. The most powerful 
figure of the Renaissance (1475-1564). 

141 Winter’s Tale , IV, iv. 

142 Antony and Cleopatra , III, xiii. 

143 Of never-ending duration. 


Ill 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 

A MONO eminent persons, those who are most dear to 
men are not of the class which the economist calls 
producers: they have nothing in their hands; they have not 
cultivated corn, nor made bread; they have not led out a 
colony, nor invented a loom. A higher class, in the estima¬ 
tion and love of this city-building, market-going race of 
mankind, are the poets, who, from the intellectual kingdom, 
feed the thought and imagination with ideas and pictures 
which raise men out of the world of corn and money, and 
console them for the short-comings of the day and the mean¬ 
ness of labor and traffic. Then, also, the philosopher has his 
value, who flatters the intellect of this laborer by engaging 
him with subtleties which instruct him in new faculties. 
Others may build cities; he is to understand them and keep 
them in awe. But there is a class who lead us into another 
region, — the world of morals or of will. What is singular 
about this region of thought is its claim. Wherever the 
sentiment of right comes in, it takes precedence of every 
thing else. For other things, I make poetry of them; but 
the moral sentiment makes poetry of me. 

I have sometimes thought that he would render the greatest 
service to modern criticism, who should draw the line of 
relation that subsists between Shakspeare and Swedenborg. 
The human mind stands ever in perplexity, demanding in¬ 
tellect, demanding sanctity, impatient equally of each with¬ 
out the other. The reconciler has not yet appeared. If we 
tire of the saints, Shakspeare is our city of refuge. Yet the 
instincts presently teach that the problem of essence must 

63 


6 4 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


take precedence of all others; — the questions of Whence? 
What? and Whither? and the solution of these must be in a 
life, and not in a book. A drama or poem is a proximate or 
oblique reply; but Moses, Menu, 1 Jesus, work directly on 
this problem. The atmosphere of moral sentiment is a 
region of grandeur which reduces all material magnificence to 
toys, yet opens to every wretch that has reason the doors of 
the universe. Almost with a fierce haste it lays its empire on 
the man. In the language of the Koran, “God said, the 
heaven and the earth and all that is between them, think ye 
that we created them in jest, and that ye shall not return to 
us?” It is the kingdom of the will, and by inspiring the will, 
which is the seat of personality, seems to convert the universe 
into a person; — 

“The realms of being to no other bow, 

Not only all are thine, but all are Thou.” 

All men are commanded by the saint. The Koran makes 
a distinct class of those who are by nature good, and whose 
goodness has an influence on others, and pronounces this 
class to be the aim of creation: the other classes are admitted 
to the feast of being, only as following in the train of this. 
And the Persian poet 2 exclaims to a soul of this kind, — 

“Go boldly forth, and feast on being’s banquet; 

Thou art the called, — the rest admitted with thee.” 

The privilege of this caste is an access to the secrets and 
structure of nature by some higher method than by experi¬ 
ence. In common parlance, what one man is said to learn by 
experience, a man of extraordinary sagacity is said, without 
experience, to divine. The Arabians say, that Abul Khain, 
the mystic, and Abu Ali Seena, the philosopher, conferred 
together; and, on parting, the philosopher said, “All that 
he sees, I know”; and the mystic said, “All that he knows, 
I see.” If one should ask the reason of this intuition, the 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 65 

solution would lead us into that property which Plato de¬ 
noted as Reminiscence, and which is implied by the Bramins 3 
of Transmigration. 4 The soul having been often born, or, as 
the Hindoos say, “travelling the path of existence through 
thousands of births,” having beheld the things which are here, 
those which are in heaven and those which are beneath, there 
is nothing of which she has not gained the knowledge: no 
wonder that she is able to recollect, in regard to any one 
thing, what formerly she knew. “For, all things in nature 
being linked and related, and the soul having heretofore 
known all, nothing hinders but that any man who has re¬ 
called to mind, or according to the common phrase has 
learned, one thing only, should of himself recover all his 
ancient knowledge, and find out again all the rest, if he have 
but courage and faint not in the midst of his researches. 
For inquiry and learning is reminiscence all.” How much 
more, if he that inquires be a holy and godlike soul! For by 
being assimilated to the original soul, by whom and after 
whom all things subsist, the soul of man does then easily 
flow into all things, and all things flow into it: they mix; 
and he is present and sympathetic with their structure and 
law. 

This path is difficult, secret, and beset with terror. The 
ancients called it ecstacy or absence, — a getting out of their 
bodies to think. All religious history contains traces of the 
trance of saints, — a beatitude, but without any sign of joy; 
earnest, solitary, even sad; “the flight,” Plotinus called it, 
“of the alone to the alone; “M vrjms, the closing of the 
eyes, — whence our word, Mystic. The trances of Socrates, 
Plotinus, 5 Porphyry, 6 Behmen, Bunyan, 7 Fox, 8 Pascal, 9 
Guyon, 10 Swedenborg, will readily come to mind. But what 
as readily comes to mind is the accompaniment of disease. 
This beatitude comes in terror, and with shocks to the mind 
of the receiver. 

“It o’erinforms the tenement of clay,” 11 and drives the 


66 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


man mad; or gives a certain violent bias which taints his 
judgment. In the chief examples of religious illumination 
somewhat morbid has mingled, in spite of the unquestionable 
increase of mental power. Must the highest good drag after 
it a quality which neutralizes and discredits it? — 

“Indeed, it takes 12 

From our achievements, when performed at height, 

The pith and marrow of our attribute.” 

Shall we say, that the economical mother disburses so much 
earth and so much fire, by weight and meter, to make a man, 
and will not add a penny-weight though a nation is perishing 
for a leader? Therefore the men of God purchased their 
science by folly or pain. If you will have pure carbon, car¬ 
buncle, or diamond, to make the brain transparent, the trunk 
and organs shall be so much the grosser: instead of porcelain 
they are potter’s earth, clay, or mud. 

l In modern times no such remarkable example of this in¬ 
troverted mind has occurred as in Emanuel Swedenborg, born 
in Stockholm, in 1688. This man, who appeared to his con¬ 
temporaries a visionary and elixir of moonbeams, no doubt 
led the most real life of any man then in the world: and now, 
when the royal and ducal Frederics, Christians, and Bruns- 
wicks 13 of that day have slid into oblivion, he begins to spread 
himself into the minds of thousands. As happens in great 
men, he seemed, by the variety and amount of his powers, 
to be a composition of several persons, — like the giant 
fruits which are matured in gardens by the union of four or 
five single blossoms. His frame is on a larger scale and 
possesses the advantages of size. As it is easier to see the 
reflection of the great sphere in large globes, though de¬ 
faced by some crack or blemish, than in drops of water, so 
men of large calibre, though with some eccentricity or mad¬ 
ness, like Pascal or Newton, help us more than balanced 
mediocre minds. 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 67 

His youth and training could not fail to be extraordinary. 
Such a body could not whistle or dance, but goes grubbing 
into mines and mountains, prying into chemistry and optics, 
physiology, mathematics, and astronomy, to find images fit 
for the measure of his versatile and capacious brain. He was a 
scholar from a child, and was educated at Upsala. 14 At the 
age of twenty-eight he was made Assessor of the Board of 
Mines by Charles XII. In 1716, he left home for four years 
and visited the universities of England, Holland, France, and 
Germany. He performed a notable feat of engineering in 
1718, at the siege of Frederikshald, 15 by hauling two galleys, 
five boats, and a sloop, some fourteen English miles overland, 
for the royal service. In 1721 he journeyed over Europe to 
examine mines and smelting works. He published in 1716 his 
Daedalus Hyperboreus, 16 and from this time for the next 
thirty years was employed in the composition and publication 
of his scientific works. With the like force he threw himself 
into theology. In 1743, when he was fifty-four years old, 
what is called his illumination began. All his metallurgy and 
transportation of ships overland was absorbed into this 
ecstasy. He ceased to publish any more scientific books, 
withdrew from his practical labors, and devoted himself to 
the writing and publication of his voluminous theological 
works, which were printed at his own expense, or at that of 
the Duke of Brunswick, or other prince, at Dresden, Leipsic, 
London, or Amsterdam. Later, he resigned his office of 
Assessor: the salary attached to this office continued to be 
paid him during his life. His duties had brought him into 
intimate acquaintance with King Charles XII., 17 by whom he 
was much consulted and honored. The like favor was con¬ 
tinued to him by his successor. At the Diet of 1751, 18 Count 
Hopken 19 says, the most solid memorials on finance were 
from his pen. In Sweden he appears to have attracted a 
marked regard. His rare science and practical skill, and the 
added fame of second sight and extraordinary religious 


68 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


knowledge and gifts, drew to him queens, nobles, clergy, 
shipmasters, and people about the ports through which he 
was wont to pass in his many voyages. The clergy interfered 
a little with the importation and publication of his religious 
works, but he seems to have kept the friendship of men in 
power. He was never married. He had great modesty 
and gentleness of bearing. His habits were simple; he lived 
on bread, milk, and vegetables; he lived in a house situated 
in a large garden; he went several times to England, where he 
does not seem to have attracted any attention whatever from 
the learned or the eminent; and died at London, March 29, 
1772, of apoplexy, in his eighty-fifth year. He is described, 
when in London, as a man of a quiet, clerical habit, not averse 
to tea and coffee, and kind to children. He wore a sword 
when in full velvet dress, and, whenever he walked out, 
carried a gold-headed cane. There is a common portrait of 
him in antique coat and wig, but the face has a wandering or 
vacant air. 

The genius which was to penetrate the science of the age 
with a far more subtle science; to pass the bounds of space 
and time, venture into the dim spirit-realm, and attempt to 
establish a new religion in the world, — began its lessons in 
quarries and forges, in the smelting-pot and crucible, in 
ship-yards and dissecting-rooms. No one man is perhaps able 
to judge of the merits of his works on so many subjects. One 
is glad to learn that his books on mines and metals are held in 
the highest esteem by those who understand these matters. 
It seems that he anticipated much science of the nineteenth 
century; anticipated, in astronomy, the discovery of the 
seventh planet, 20 — but, unhappily, not also of the eighth; 
anticipated the views of modern astronomy in regard to the 
generation of earths by the sun; in magnetism, some import¬ 
ant experiments and conclusions of later students; in chem¬ 
istry, the atomic theory; 21 in anatomy, the discoveries of 
Schlichting, 22 Monro, 23 and Wilson; 24 and first demonstrated 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 69 

the office of the lungs. His excellent English editor magnan¬ 
imously lays no stress on his discoveries, since he was too 
great to care to be original; and we are to judge, by what he 
ca.n spare, of what remains. 

A colossal soul, he lies vast abroad on his times, uncompre¬ 
hended by them, and requires a long focal distance to be seen; 
suggests, as Aristotle, Bacon, Selden, 26 Humboldt, 26 that a 
certain vastness of learning, or quasi omnipresence of the 
human soul in nature, is possible. His superb speculation, as 
from a tower, over nature and arts, without ever losing 
sight of the texture and sequence of things, almost realizes 
his own picture, in the “Principia,” of the original integrity of 
man. Over and above the merit of his particular discoveries, 
is the capital merit of his self-equality. A drop of water has 
the properties of the sea, but cannot exhibit a storm. There 
is beauty of a concert, as well as of a flute; strength of a host, 
as well as of a hero; and, in Swedenborg, those who are best 
acquainted with modern books will most admire the merit of 
mass. One of the missouriums 27 and mastodons 28 of litera¬ 
ture, he is not to be measured by whole colleges of ordinary 
scholars. His stalwart presence would flutter the gowns of an 
university. Our books are false by being fragmentary; their 
sentences are bonmots , 29 and not parts of natural discourse; 
childish expressions of surprise or pleasure in nature; or, 
worse, owing a brief notoriety to their petulance, or aversion 
from the order of nature; — being some curiosity or oddity, 
designedly not in harmony with nature and purposely framed 
to excite surprise, as jugglers do by concealing their means. 
But Swedenborg is systematic and respective of the world 
in every sentence; all the means are orderly given; his 
faculties work with astronomic punctuality, and this ad¬ 
mirable writing is pure from all pertness or egotism. 

Swedenborg was born into an atmosphere of great ideas. 
It is hard to say what was his own: yet his life was dignified 
by noblest pictures of the universe. The robust Aristotelian 


70 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


method, with its breadth and adequateness,' shaming our 
sterile and linear logic by its genial radiation, conversant 
with series and degree, with effects and ends, skilful to dis¬ 
criminate power from form, essence from accident, and 
opening, by its terminology and definition, high roads into 
nature, had trained a race of athletic philosophers. Harvey 30 
had shown the circulation of the blood; Gilbert 31 had shown 
that the earth was a magnet; Descartes , 32 taught by Gilbert’s 
magnet, with its vortex, spiral, and polarity, had filled Europe 
with the leading thought of vortical motion, as the secret of 
nature. Newton, in the year in which Swedenborg was born, 
published the “Principia,” and established the universal 
gravity. Malpighi , 33 following the high doctrines of Hippoc¬ 
rates^* Leucippus , 35 and Lucretius , 36 had given emphasis to 
the dogma that nature works in leasts, — “tota in minimis 
existit natura.” Unrivalled dissectors, Swammerdam , 37 
Leuwenhoek , 38 Winslow , 39 Eustachius , 40 Heister , 41 Vesalius , 42 
Boerhaave , 43 had left nothing for scalpel or microscope to 
reveal in human or comparative anatomy: Linnaeus , 44 his 
contemporary, was affirming, in his beautiful science, that 
“Nature is always like herself:” and, lastly, the nobility of 
method, the largest application of principles, had been ex¬ 
hibited by Leibnitz 46 and Christian Wolff , 46 in cosmology; 
whilst Locke and Grotius 47 had drawn the moral argument. 
What was left for a genius of the largest calibre but to go over 
their ground and verify and unite? It is easy to see, in these 
minds, the origin of Swedenborg’s studies, and the suggestion 
of his problems. He had a capacity to entertain and vivify 
these volumes of thought. Yet the proximity of these gen¬ 
iuses, one or other of whom had introduced all his leading 
ideas, makes Swedenborg another example of the difficulty, 
even in a highly fertile genius, of proving originality, the first 
birth and annunciation of one of the laws of nature. 

He named his favorite views the doctrine of Forms, the 
doctrine of Series and Degrees, the doctrine of Influx, the 


71 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 

doctrine of Correspondence. His statement of these doc¬ 
trines deserves to be studied in his books. Not every man can 
read them, but they will reward him who can. His theologic 
works are valuable to illustrate these. His writings would be 
a sufficient library to a lonely and athletic student; and the 
“Economy of the Animal Kingdom” is one of those books 
which, by the sustained dignity of thinking, is an honor to 
the human race. He had studied spars and metals to some 
purpose. His varied and solid knowledge makes his style 
lustrous with points and shooting spiculae of thought, and 
resembling one of those winter mornings when the air sparkles 
with crystals. The grandeur of the topics makes the grandeur 
of the style. He was apt for cosmology, because of that native 
perception of identity which made mere size of no account to 
him. In the atom of magnetic iron he saw the quality which 
would generate the spiral motion of sun and planet. 

The thoughts in which he lived were, the universality of 
each law in nature; the Platonic doctrine of the scale or 
degrees; the version or conversion of each into other, and so 
the correspondence of all the parts; the fine secret that little 
explains large, and large, little; the centrality of man in 
nature, and the connection that subsists throughout all things: 
he saw that the human body was strictly universal, or an 
instrument through which the soul feeds and is fed by the 
whole of matter; so that he held, in exact antagonism to the 
skeptics, that “the wiser a man is, the more will he be a 
worshipper of the Deity.” In short, he was a believer in the 
Identity-philosophy, which he held not idly, as the dreamers 
of Berlin or Boston, but which he experimented with and 
established through years of labor, with the heart and strength 
of the rudest Viking 48 that his rough Sweden ever sent to 
battle. 

This theory dates from the oldest philosophers, and derives 
perhaps its best illustration from the newest. It is this, that 
Nature iterates her means perpetually on successive planes. 


72 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


In the old aphorism, nature is always self-similar. In the 
plant, the eye or germinative point opens to a leaf, then to 
another leaf, with a power of transforming the leaf into 
radicle, stamen, pistil, petal, bract, sepal, or seed. The whole 
art of the plant is still to repeat leaf on leaf without end, the 
more or less of heat, light, moisture, and food determining 
the form it shall assume. In the animal, nature makes a 
vertebra, or a spine of vertebrae, and helps herself still by a 
new spine, with a limited power of modifying its form, — 
spine on spine, to the end of the world. A poetic anatomist, 
in our own day, teaches that a snake, being a horizontal line, 
and man, being an erect line, constitute a right angle; and 
between the lines of this mystical quadrant all animated 
beings find their place: and he assumes the hair-worm, the 
span-worm, or the snake, as the type of prediction of the spine. 
Manifestly, at the end'of the spine, Nature puts out smaller 
spines, as arms; at the end of the arms, new spines, as hands; 
at the other end, she repeats the process, as legs and feet. 
At the top of the column she puts out another spine, which 
doubles or loops itself over, as a span-worm, into a ball, 
and forms the skull, with extremities again: the hands being 
now the upper jaw, the feet the lower jaw, the fingers and! 
toes being represented this time by upper and lower teeth.. 
This new spine is destined to high uses. It is a new man on 
the shoulders of the last. It can almost shed its trunk andl 
manage to live alone, according to the Platonic idea in the 
Timaeus. Within it, on a higher plane, all that was done in. 
the trunk repeats itself. Nature recites her lesson once more 
in a higher mood. The mind is a finer body, and resumes its 
functions of feeding, digesting, absorbing, excluding, and gen¬ 
erating, in a new and ethereal element. Here in the brain is 
all the process of alimentation repeated, in the acquiring,, 
comparing, digesting, and assimilating of experience. Here 
again is the mystery of generation repeated. In the brain 
are male and female faculties; here is marriage, here is fruit. 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 73 

And there is no limit to this ascending scale, but series on 
series. Every thing, at the end of one use, is taken up into 
the next, each series punctually repeating every organ and 
process of the last. We are adapted to infinity. We are hard 
to please, and love nothing which ends; and in nature is no 
end, but every thing at the end of one use is lifted into a 
superior, and the ascent of these things climbs into daemonic 
and celestial natures. Creative force, like a musical com¬ 
poser, goes on unweariedly repeating a simple air or theme, 
now high, now low, in solo, in chorus, ten thousand times 
reverberated, till it fills earth and heaven with the chant. 

Gravitation, as explained by Newton, is good, but grander 
when we find chemistry only an extension of the law of masses 
into particles, and that the atomic theory shows the action of 
chemistry to be mechanical also. Metaphysics shows us 
a sort of gravitation operative also in the mental phenomena; 
and the terrible tabulation of the French statists 49 brings 
every piece of whim and humor to be reducible also to exact 
numerical ratios. If one man in twenty thousand, or in thirty 
thousand, eats shoes or marries his grandmother, then in every 
twenty thousand or thirty thousand is found one man who 
eats shoes or marries his grandmother. What we call gravi¬ 
tation, and fancy ultimate, is one fork of a mightier stream 
for which we have yet no name. Astronomy is excellent; 
but it must come up into life to have its full value, and not 
remain there in globes and spaces. The globule of blood 
gyrates around its own axis in the human veins, as the planet 
in the sky; and the circles of intellect relate to those of the 
heavens. Each law of nature has the like universality; 
eating, sleep or hybernation, rotation, generation, metamor¬ 
phosis, vortical motion, which is seen in eggs as in planets. 
These grand rhymes or returns in nature, — the dear, best- 
known face startling us at every turn, under 3 mask so un¬ 
expected that we think it the face of a stranger, and carrying 
up the semblance into divine forms, — delighted the pro- 


74 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


phetic eye of Swedenborg; and he must be reckoned a leader 
in that revolution, which, by giving to science an idea, has 
given to an aimless accumulation of experiments, guidance 
and form and a beating heart. 

I own with some regret that his printed works amount to 
about fifty stout octavos, his scientific works being about 
half of the whole number; and it appears that a mass of 
manuscript still unedited remains in the royal library at 
Stockholm. The scientific works have just now been trans¬ 
lated into English, in an excellent edition. 

Swedenborg printed these scientific books in the ten years 
from 1734 to 1744, and they remained from that time neg¬ 
lected; and now, after their century is complete, he has at 
last found a pupil in Mr. Wilkinson, 60 in London, a philosophic 
critic, with a co-equal vigor of understanding and imagination 
comparable only to Lord Bacon’s, who has restored his 
master’s buried books to the day, and transferred them, with 
every advantage, from their forgotten Latin into English, to 
go round the world in our commercial and conquering tongue. 
This startling reappearance of Swedenborg, after a hundred 
years, in his pupil, is not the least remarkable fact in his his¬ 
tory. Aided it is said by the munificence of Mr. Clissold, 51 
and also by his literary skill, this piece of poetic justice 
is done. The admirable preliminary discourses with which 
Mr. Wilkinson has enriched these volumes, throw all the 
contemporary philosophy of England into shade, and leave 
me nothing to say on their proper grounds. 

The “Animal Kingdom” is a book of wonderful merits. 
It was written with the highest end, — to put science and the 
soul, long estranged from each other, at one again. It was an 
anatomist’s account of the human body, in the highest style 
of poetry. Nothing can exceed the bold and brilliant treat¬ 
ment of a subject usually so dry and repulsive. He saw 
nature “wreathing through an everlasting spiral, with wheels 
that never dry, on axles that never creak,” and sometimes 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 


75 


sought “to uncover those secret recesses where Nature is sit¬ 
ting at the fires in the depths of her laboratory;” whilst the 
picture comes recommended by the hard fidelity with which 
it is based on practical anatomy. It is remarkable that this 
sublime genius decided peremptorily for the analytic, against 
the synthetic method; and, in a book whose genius is a daring 
poetic synthesis, claims to confine himself to a rigid experience. 

He knows, if he only, the flowing of nature, and how wise 
was that old answer of Amasis 52 to him who bade him drink 
up the sea, — “Yes, willingly, if you will stop the rivers that 
flow in.” Few knew as much about nature and her subtle 
manners, or expressed more subtly her goings. He thought as 
large a demand is made on our faith by nature, as by miracles. 
“He noted that in her proceeding from first principles through 
her several subordinations, there was no state through which 
she did not pass, as if her path lay through all things.” “For 
as often as she betakes herself upward from visible phenomena, 
or, in other words, withdraws herself inward, she instantly as 
it were disappears, while no one knows what has become of 
her, or whither she is gone: so that it is necessary to take 
science as a guide in pursuing her steps.” 

The pursuing the inquiry under the light of an end or final 
cause gives wonderful animation, a sort of personality to the 
whole writing. This book announces his favorite dogmas. 
The ancient doctrine of Hippocrates, that the brain is a gland; 
and of Leucippus, that the atom may be known by the mass; 
or, in Plato, the macrocosm by the microcosm; and, in the 
verses of Lucretius, — 53 

Ossa videlicet e pauxillis atque minutis 
Ossibus sic et de pauxillis atque minutis 
Visceribus viscus gigni, sanguenque creari 
Sanguinis inter se multis coeuntibus guttis; 

Ex aurique putat micis consistere posse 
Aurum, et de terris terram concrescere parvis; 

Ignibus ex igneis, humorem humoribus esse. 

Lib. I. 835. 


76 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


“The principle of all things, entrails made 
Of smallest entrails; bone, of smallest bone; 

Blood, of small sanguine drops reduced to one; 

Gold, of small grains; earth, of small sands compacted; 
Small drops to water, sparks to fire contracted: ” 

and which Malpighi had summed in his maxim that “nature 
exists entire in leasts,” — is a favorite thought of Swedenborg. 
“ It is a consant law of the organic body that large, compound, 
or visible forms exist and subsist from smaller, simpler, and 
ultimately from invisible forms, which act similarly to the 
larger ones, but more perfectly and more universally; and 
the least forms so perfectly and universally as to involve an 
idea representative of their entire universe.” The unities of 
each organ are so many little organs, homogeneous with their 
compound: the unities of the tongue are little tongues; those 
of the stomach, little stomachs; those of the heart are little 
hearts. This fruitful idea furnishes a key to every secret. 
What was too small for the eye to detect was read by the 
aggregates; what was too large, by the units. There is no 
end to his application of the thought. “Hunger is an aggre¬ 
gate of very many little hungers, or losses of blood by the 
little veins all over the body.” It is a key to his theology 
also. “Man is a kind of very minute heaven, corresponding 
to the world of spirits and to heaven. Every particular idea 
of man, and every affection, yea, every smallest part of his 
affection, is an image and effigy of him. A spirit may be 
known from only a single thought. God is the grand man.” 

The hardihood and thoroughness of his study of nature 
required a theory of forms also. “Forms ascend in order 
from the lowest to the highest. The lowest form is angular, 
or the terrestrial and corporeal. The second and next higher 
form is the circular, which is also called the perpetual-angular, 
because the circumference of a circle is a perpetual angle. 
The form above this is the spiral, parent and measure of 
circular forms; its diameters are not rectilinear, but variously 


77 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 

circular, and have a spherical surface for centre; therefore 
it is called the perpetual-circular. The form above this is the 
vortical, or perpetual-spiral: next, the perpetual-vortical, or 
celestial: last, the perpetual-celestial, or spiritual.” 

Was it strange that a genius so bold should take the last step 
also, should conceive that he might attain the science of all 
sciences, to unlock the meaning of the world? In the first 
volume of the “Animal Kingdom,” he broaches the subject in 
a remarkable note: — “In our doctrine of Representations 
and Correspondences we shall treat of both these symbolical 
and typical resemblances, and of the astonishing things which 
occur, I will not say in the living body only, but throughout 
nature, and which correspond so entirely to supreme and 
spiritual things that one would swear that the physical world 
was purely symbolical of the spiritual world; insomuch that 
if we choose to express any natural truth in physical and defi¬ 
nite vocal terms, and to convert these terms only into the 
corresponding and spiritual terms, we shall by this means 
elicit a spiritual truth or theological dogma, in place of the 
physical truth or precept: although no mortal would have 
predicted that any thing of the kind could possibly arise by 
bare literal transposition; inasmuch as the one precept, con¬ 
sidered separately from the other, appears to have absolutely 
no relation to it. I intend hereafter to communicate a number 
of examples of such correspondences, together with a vo¬ 
cabulary containing the terms of spiritual things, as well as 
of the physical things for which they are to be substituted. 
This symbolism pervades the living body.” 

The fact thus explicitly stated is implied in all poetry, in 
allegory, in fable, in the use of emblems, and in the structure of 
language. Plato knew it, as is evident from his twice bisected 
line in the sixth book of the Republic. Lord Bacon had found 
that truth and nature differed only as seal and print; and he 
instanced some physical propositions, with their translation 
into a moral or political sense. Behmen, and all mystics, 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


78 

imply this law in their dark riddle-writing. The poets, in as 
far as they are poets, use it; but it is known to them only as 
the magnet was known for ages, as a toy. Swedenborg first 
put the fact into a detached and scientific statement, because 
it was habitually present to him, and never not seen. It was 
involved, as we explained already, in the doctrine of identity 
and iteration, because the mental series exactly tallies with 
the material series. It required an insight that could rank 
things in order and series; or rather it required such rightness 
of position that the poles of the eye should coincide with the 
axis of the world. The earth had fed its mankind through 
five or six millenniums, and they had sciences, religions, phi¬ 
losophies, and yet had failed to see the correspondence of 
meaning between every part and every other part. And, down 
to this hour, literature has no book in which the symbolism of 
things is scientifically opened. One would say that as soon 
as men had the first hint that every sensible object, — animal, 
rock, river, air, — nay, space and time, subsists not for itself, 
nor finally to a material end, but as a picture-language to tell 
another story of beings and duties, other science would be 
put by, and a science of such grand presage would absorb all 
faculties: that each man would ask of all objects what they 
mean: Why does the horizon hold me fast, with my joy and 
grief, in this centre? Why hear I the same sense from count¬ 
less differing voices, and read one never quite expressed fact in 
endless picture-language? Yet whether it be that these things 
will not be intellectually learned, or that many centuries must 
elaborate and compose so rare and opulent a soul, — there is 
no comet, rock-stratum, fossil, fish, quadruped, spider, or 
fungus, that, for itself, does not interest more scholars and 
classifiers than the meaning and upshot of the frame of things. 

But Swedenborg was not content with the culinary use of 
the world. In his fifty-fourth year these thoughts held him 
fast, and his profound mind admitted the perilous opinion, 
too frequent in religious history, that he was an abnormal 


79 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 

person, to whom was granted the privilege of conversing with 
angels and spirits; and this ecstasy connected itself with just 
this office of explaining the moral import of the sensible 
world. To a right perception, at once broad and minute, of 
the order of nature, he added the comprehension of the moral 
laws in their widest social aspects; but whatever he saw, 
through some excessive determination to form in his consti¬ 
tution, he saw not abstractly, but in pictures, heard it in 
dialogues, constructed it in events. When he attempted to 
announce the law most sanely, he was forced to couch it in 
parable. 

Modern psychology offers no similar example of a deranged 
balance. The principal powers continued to maintain a 
healthy action, and to a reader who can make due allowance 
in the report for the reporter’s peculiarities, the results are 
still instructive, and a more striking testimony to the sublime 
laws he announced than any that balanced dulness could 
afford. He attempts to give some account of the modus of 
the new state, affirming that “his presence in the spiritual 
world is attended with a certain separation, but only as to the 
intellectual part of his mind, not as to the will part”; and he 
affirms that “he sees, with the internal sight, the things that 
are in another life, more clearly than he sees the things which 
are here in the world.” 

Having adopted the belief that certain books of the Old 
and New Testaments were exact allegories, or written in the 
angelic and ecstatic mode, he employed his remaining years in 
extricating from the literal, the universal sense. He had 
borrowed from Plato the fine fable of “a most ancient people, 
men better than we and dwelling nigher to the gods”; and 
Swedenborg added that they used the earth symbolically; 
that these, when they saw terrestrial objects, did not think 
at all about them, but only about those which they signified. 
The correspondence between thoughts and things hence¬ 
forward occupied him. “The very organic form resembles 


8o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


the end inscribed on it.” A man is in general and in par¬ 
ticular an organized justice or injustice, selfishness or grati¬ 
tude. And the cause of this harmony he assigned in the 
Arcana: “The reason why all and single things, in the heavens 
and on earth, are representative, is because they exist from an 
influx of the Lord, through heaven.” This design of exhibit¬ 
ing such correspondences, which, if adequately executed, 
would be the poem of the world, in which all history and 
science would play an essential part, was narrowed and de¬ 
feated by the exclusively theologic direction which his in¬ 
quiries took. His perception of nature is not human and 
universal, but is mystical and Hebraic. He fastens each 
natural object to a theologic notion; — a horse signifies 
carnal understanding; a tree, perception; the moon, faith; 
a cat means this; an ostrich that; an artichoke this other; — 
and poorly tethers every symbol to a several ecclesiastic sense. 
The slippery Proteus 55 is not so easily caught. In nature, 
each individual symbol plays innumerable parts, as each 
particle of matter circulates in turn through every system. 
The central identity enables any one symbol to express 
successively all the qualities and shades of real being. In the 
transmission of the heavenly waters, every hose fits every 
hydrant. Nature avenges herself speedily on the hard 
pedantry that would chain her waves. She is no literalist. 
Every thing must be taken genially, and we must be at the 
top of our condition to understand any thing rightly. 

His theological bias thus fatally narrowed his interpretation 
of nature, and the dictionary of symbols is yet to be written. 
But the interpreter whom mankind must still expect, will 
find no predecessor who has approached so near to the true 
problem. 

Swedenborg styles himself in the title-page of his books, 
“Servant of the Lord Jesus Christ”; and by force of 
intellect, and in effect, he is the last Father in the 
Church, and is not likely to have a successor. No wonder 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 81 

that his depth of ethical wisdom should give him influ¬ 
ence as a teacher. To the withered traditional church, 
yielding dry catechisms, he let in nature again, and the 
worshipper, escaping from the vestry of verbs and texts, is 
surprised to find himself a party to the whole of his religion. 
His religion thinks for him and is of universal application. 
He turns it on every side; it fits every part of life, interprets 
and dignifies every circumstance. Instead of a religion which 
visited him diplomatically three or four times, — when he 
was born, when he married, when he fell sick, and when he 
died, and, for the rest, never interfered with him, — here 
was a teaching which accompanied him all day, accompanied 
him even into sleep and dreams; into his thinking, and showed 
him through what a long ancestry his thoughts descend; into 
society, and showed by what affinities he was girt to his 
equals and his counterparts; into natural objects, and showed 
their origin and meaning, what are friendly, and what are 
hurtful; and opened the future world by indicating the con¬ 
tinuity of the same laws. His disciples allege that their in¬ 
tellect is invigorated by the study of his books. 

There is no such problem for criticism as his theological 
writings, their merits are so commanding, yet such grave 
deductions must be made. Their immense and sandy diffuse¬ 
ness is like the prairie or the desert, and their incongruities 
are like the last deliration. 56 He is superfluously explanatory, 
and his feeling of the ignorance of men, strangely exaggerated. 
Men take truths of this nature very fast. Yet he abounds in 
assertions, he is a rich discoverer, and of things which most 
import us to know. His thought dwells in essential resem¬ 
blances, like the resemblance of a house to the man who built 
it. He saw things in their law, in likeness of function, not of 
structure. There is an invariable method and order in his 
delivery of truth, the habitual proceeding of the mind from 
inmost to outmost. What earnestness and weightiness, — 
his eye never roving, without one swell of vanity, or one look 


82 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


to self in any common form of literary pride! a theoretic or 
speculative man, but whom no practical man in the universe 
could affect to scorn. Plato is a gownsman; his garment, 
though of purple, and almost sky-woven, is an academic robe 
and hinders action with its voluminous folds. But this mystic 
is awful to Caesar. Lycurgus 57 himself would bow. 

The moral insight of Swedenborg, the correction of popular 
errors, the announcement of ethical laws, take him out of 
comparison with any other modern writer and entitle him to a 
place, vacant for some ages, among the lawgivers of mankind. 
That slow but commanding influence which he has acquired, 
like that of other religious geniuses, must be excessive also, 
and have its tides, before it subsides into a permanent amount. 
Of course what is real and universal cannot be confined to the 
circle of those who sympathize strictly with his genius, but 
will pass forth into the common stock of wise and just think¬ 
ing. The world has a sure chemistry, by which it extracts 
.what is excellent in its children and lets fall the infirmities and 
limitations of the grandest mind. 

That metempsychosis which is familiar in the old mythology 
of the Greeks, collected in Ovid 58 and in the Indian Transmi¬ 
gration, and is there objective, or really takes place in bodies 
by alien will, — in Swedenborg’s mind has a more philosophic 
character. It is subjective, or depends entirely upon the 
thought of the person. All things in the universe arrange 
themselves to each person anew, according to his ruling love. 
Man is such as his affection and thought are. Man is man by 
virtde of willing, not by virtue of knowing and understanding. 
As he is, so he sees. The marriages of the world are broken up. 
Interiors associate all in the spiritual world. Whatever the 
angels looked upon was to them celestial. Each Satan appears 
to himself a man; to those as bad as he, a comely man; to the 
purified, a heap of carrion. Nothing can resist states: every 
thing gravitates: like will to like: what we call poetic justice 
takes effect on the spot. We have come into a world which is 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 83 

a living poem. Every thing is as I am. Bird and beast is not 
bird and beast, but emanation and effluvia of the minds and 
wills of men there present. Every one makes his own house 
and state. The ghosts are tormented with the fear of death 
and cannot remember that they have died. They who are in 
evil and falsehood are afraid of all others. Such as have de¬ 
prived themselves of charity, wander and flee: the societies 
which they approach discover their quality and drive them 
away. The covetous seem to themselves to be abiding in cells 
where their money is deposited, and these to be infested with 
mice. They who place merit in good works seem to themselves 
to cut wood. “ I asked such, if they were not wearied? They 
replied, that they have not yet done work enough to merit 
heaven.” 

He delivers golden sayings which express with singular 
beauty the ethical laws; as when he uttered that famed 
sentence, that “In heaven the angels are advancing con¬ 
tinually to the springtime of their youth, so that the oldest 
angel appears the youngest”: “The more angels, the more 
room”: “The perfection of man is the love of use”: “Man, 
in his perfect form, is heaven”: “What is from Him, is 
Him”: “Ends always ascend as nature descends.” And the 
truly poetic account of the writing in the inmost heaven, 
which, as it consists of inflexions according to the form of 
heaven, can be read without instruction. He almost justifies 
his claim to preternatural vision, by strange insights of the 
structure of the human body and mind. “It is never per¬ 
mitted to any one, in heaven, to stand behind another and 
look at the back of his head; for then the influx which is from 
the Lord is disturbed.” The angels, from the sound of the 
voice, know a man’s love; from the articulation of the sound, 
his wisdom; and from the sense of the words, his science. 

In the “Conjugal Love,” he has unfolded the science of 
marriage. Of this book one would say that with the highest 
elements it has failed of success. It came near to be the 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


■84 

Hymn of Love, which Plato attempted in the “Banquet”; 
the love, which, Dante says, Casella 59 sang among the angels 
in Paradise; and which, as rightly celebrated, in its genesis, 
fruition, and effect, might well entrance the souls, as it would 
lay open the genesis of all institutions, customs, and manners. 
The book had been grand if the Hebraism had been omitted 
and the law stated without Gothicism, 60 as ethics, and with 
that scope for ascension of state which the nature of things 
requires. It is a fine Platonic development of the science of 
marriage; teaching that sex is universal, and not local; 
virility in the male qualifying every organ, act, and thought; 
and the feminine in woman. Therefore in the real or spiritual 
world the nuptial union is not momentary, but incessant and 
total; and chastity not a local, but a universal virtue; un¬ 
chastity being discovered as much in the trading, or planting, 
or speaking, or philosophizing, as in generation; and that, 
though the virgins he saw in heaven were beautiful, the 
wives were incomparably more beautiful, and went on increas¬ 
ing in beauty evermore. 

Yet Swedenborg, after his mode, pinned his theory to a 
temporary form. He exaggerates the circumstance of mar¬ 
riage; and though he finds false marriages on earth, fancies a 
wiser choice in heaven. But of progressive souls, all loves and 
friendships are momentary. Do you love me? means, Do you 
see the same truth? If you do, we are happy with the same 
happiness: but presently one of us passes into the perception 
of new truth; — we are divorced, and no tension in nature 
can hold us to each other. I know how delicious is this cup 
of love, — I existing for you, you existing for me; but it is a 
child’s clinging to his toy; an attempt to eternize the fireside 
and nuptial chamber; to keep the picture-alphabet through 
which our first lessons are prettily conveyed. The Eden of 
God is bare and grand: like the outdoor landscape remem¬ 
bered from the evening fireside, it seems cold and desolate 
whilst you cower over the coals, but once abroad again, we 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 85 

pity those who can forego the magnificence of nature for 
candle-light and cards. Perhaps the true subject of the 
“Conjugal Love”* is Conversation , whose laws are profoundly 
set forth. It is false, if literally applied to marriage. For 
God is the bride or bridegroom of the soul. Heaven is not 
the pairing of two, but the communion of all souls. We meet, 
and dwell an instant under the temple of one thought, and 
part, as though we parted not, to join another thought in 
other fellowships of joy. So far from there being anything 
divine in the low and proprietary sense of Do you love me? 
it is only when you leave and lose me by casting yourself on a 
sentiment which is higher than both of us, that I draw near 
and find myself at your side; and I am repelled if you fix your 
eye on me and demand love. In fact, in the spiritual world 
we change sexes every moment. You love the worth in me; 
then I am your husband: but it is not me, but the worth, that 
fixes the love: and that worth is a drop of the ocean of worth 
that is beyond me. Meantime I adore the greater worth in 
another, and so become his wife. He aspires to a higher worth 
in another spirit, and is wife or receiver of that influence. 

Whether from a self-inquisitorial habit that he grew into 
from jealousy of the sins to which men of thought are liable, 
he has acquired, in disentangling and demonstrating that par¬ 
ticular form of moral disease, an acumen which no conscience 
can resist. I refer to his feeling of the profanation of thinking 
to what is good, “from scientifics.” “To reason about faith, 
is to doubt and deny.” He was painfully alive to the difference 
between knowing and doing, and this sensibility is incessantly 
expressed. Philosophers are, therefore, vipers, cockatrices, 
asps, hemorrhoids, presters, and flying serpents; literary men 
are conjurors and charlatans. 

But this topic suggests a sad afterthought, that here we 
find the seat of his own pain. Possibly Swedenborg paid the 
penalty of introverted faculties. Success, or a fortunate 
genius, seems to depend on a happy adjustment of heart and 


86 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


brain; on a due proportion, hard to hit, of moral and mental 
power, which perhaps obeys the law of those chemical ratios 
which make a proportion in volumes necessary to combina¬ 
tion, as when gases will combine in certain fixed rates, but 
not at any rate. It is hard to carry a full cup; and this man, 
profusely endowed in heart and mind, early fell into dan¬ 
gerous discord with himself. In his Animal Kingdom he 
surprised us by declaring that he loved analysis, and not syn¬ 
thesis; and now, after his fiftieth year, he falls into jealousy 
of his intellect; and though aware that truth is not solitary 
nor is goodness solitary, but both must ever mix and marry, 
he makes war on his mind, takes the part of the conscience 
against it, and, on all occasions, traduces and blasphemes it. 
The violence is instantly avenged. Beauty is disgraced, love is 
unlovely, when truth, the half part of heaven, is denied, as 
much as when a bitterness in men of talent leads to satire and 
destroys the judgment. He is wise, but wise in his own de¬ 
spite. There is an air of infinite grief and the sound of wailing 
all over and through this lurid universe. A vampyre sits in 
the seat of the prophet and turns with gloomy appetite to 
images of pain. Indeed, a bird does not more readily weave its 
nest, or a mole bore into the ground, than this seer of the souls 
substructs a new hell and pit, each more abominable than the 
last, round every new crew of offenders. He was let down 
through a column that seemed of brass, but it was formed of 
angelic spirits, that he might descend safely amongst the 
unhappy, and witness the vastation of souls and hear there, 
for a long continuance, their lamentations: he saw their 
tormentors, who increase and strain pangs to infinity; he saw 
the hell of the jugglers, the hell of the assassins, the hell of 
the lascivious; the hell of robbers, who kill and boil men; the 
infernal tun of the deceitful; the excrementitious hells; the 
hell of the .revengeful, whose faces resembled a round, broad 
cake, and their arms rotate like a wheel. Except Rabelais 61 
and Dean Swift 62 nobody ever had suQh science of filth and 
corruptiorl. 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 87 

These books should be used with caution. It is dangerous 
to sculpture these evanescing images of thought. True in 
transition, they become false if fixed. It requires, for his 
just apprehension, almost a genius equal to his own. But 
when his visions become the stereotyped language of multi¬ 
tudes of persons of all degrees of age and capacity, they are 
perverted. The wise people of the Greek race were ac¬ 
customed to lead the most intelligent and virtuous young 
men, as part of their education, through the Eleusinian mys¬ 
teries, 63 wherein, with much pomp and graduation, the highest 
truths known to ancient wisdom were taught. An ardent and 
contemplative young man, at eighteen or twenty years, 
might read once these books of Swedenborg, these mysteries 
of love and conscience, and then throw them aside for ever. 
Genius is ever haunted by similar dreams, when the hells and 
the heavens are opened to it. But these pictures are to be held 
as mystical, that is, as a quite arbitrary and accidental pic¬ 
ture of the truth, — not as the truth. Any other symbol 
would be as good; then this is safely seen. 

Swedenborg’s system of the world wants central spontane¬ 
ity; it is dynamic, not vital, and lacks power to generate life. 
There is no individual in it. The universe is a gigantic crystal, 
all of whose atoms and laminae lie in uninterrupted order and 
with unbroken unity, but cold and still. What seems an 
individual and a will, is none. There is an immense chain of 
intermediation, extending from centre to extremes, which 
bereaves every agency of all freedom and character. The 
universe, in his poem, suffers under a magnetic sleep, and only 
reflects the mind of the magnetizer. Every thought comes 
into each mind by influence from a society of spirits that 
surround it, and into these from a higher society, and so on. 
All his types mean the same few things. All his figures 
speak one speech. All his interlocutors Swedenborgize. Be 
they who they may, to this complexion must they come at 
last. This Charon 64 ferries them all over in his boat; kings, 
counsellors, cavaliers, doctors, Sir Isaac Newton, Sir Hans 


88 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


Sloane, 65 King George II., Mahomet, 66 or whomsoever, and all 
gather one grimness of hue and style. Only when Cicero 67 
comes by, our gentle seer sticks a little at saying he talked 
with Cicero, and with a touch of human relenting remarks, 
“one whom it was given me to believe was Cicero”; and when 
the soi disant 68 Roman opens his mouth, Rome and eloquence 
have ebbed away, — it is plain theologic Swedenborg like 
the rest. His heavens and hells are dull; fault of want of 
individualism. The thousandfold relation • of men is not 
there. The interest that attaches in nature to each man, 
because he is right by his wrong, and wrong by his right; 
because he defies all dogmatizing and classification, so many 
allowances and contingences and futurities are to be taken into 
account; strong by his vices, often paralyzed by his virtues; — 
sinks into entire sympathy with his society. This want reacts 
to the centre of the system. Though the agency of “the 
Lord” is in every line referred to by name, it never becomes 
alive. There is no lustre in that eye which gazes from the 
centre and which should vivify the immense dependency of 
beings. 

The vice of Swedenborg’s mind is its theologic determina¬ 
tion. Nothing with him has the liberality of universal wisdom, 
but we are always in a church. That Hebrew muse, which 
taught the lore of right and wrong to men, had the same ex¬ 
cess of influence for him it has had for the nations. The 
mode, as well as the essence, was sacred. Palestine is ever 
the more valuable as a chapter in universal history, and ever 
the less an available element in education. The genius of 
Swedenborg, largest of all modern souls in this department of 
thought, wasted itself in the endeavor to reanimate and 
conserve what had already arrived at its natural term, and, 
in the great secular Providence, was retiring from its promi¬ 
nence, before Western modes of thought and expression. 
Swedenborg and Behmen both failed by attaching them¬ 
selves to the Christian symbol, instead of to the moral senti- 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 89 

ment, which carries innumerable Christianities, humanities, 
divinities, in its bosom. 

The excess of influence shows itself in the incongruous 
importation of a foreign rhetoric. “What have I to do,” 
asks the impatient reader, “with jasper and sardonyx, beryl, 
and chalcedony; what with arks and passovers, ephahs 
and ephods; what with lepers and emerods; what with 
heave-offerings and unleavened bread, chariots of fire, dragons 
crowned and horned, behemoth and unicorn? Good for 
Orientals, these are nothing to me. The more learning you 
bring to explain them, the more glaring the impertinence. 
The more coherent and elaborate the system, the less I like 
it. I say, with the Spartan, ‘Why do you speak so much to 
the purpose, of that which is nothing to the purpose? ’ My 
learning is such as God gave me in my birth and habit, in the 
delight and study of my eyes and not of another man’s. Of 
all absurdities, this of some foreigner proposing to take away 
j my rhetoric and substitute his own, and amuse me with 
pelican and stork, instead of thrush and robin; palm-trees and 
shittim-wood, instead of sassafras and hickory, — seems the 
most needless.” 

Locke said, “God, when he makes the prophet, does not 
unmake the man.” Swedenborg’s history points the remark. 
The parish disputes in the Swedish church between the 
friends and foes of Luther 69 and Melancthon, 70 concerning 
“faith alone” and “works alone,” intrude themselves into 
his speculations upon the economy of the universe, and of the 
celestial societies. The Lutheran bishop’s son, for whom the 
heavens are opened, so that he sees with eyes and in the rich¬ 
est symbolic forms the awful truth of things, and utters 
again in his books, as under a heavenly mandate, the in¬ 
disputable secrets of moral nature, — with all these grandeurs 
resting upon him, remains the Lutheran bishop’s son; his 
judgments are those of a Swedish polemic, and his vast en¬ 
largements purchased by adamantine limitations. He carries 


9 o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


his controversial memory with him in his visits to the souls. 
He is like Michael Angelo, 71 who, in his frescoes, put the 
cardinal who had offended him to roast under a mountain of 
devils; or like Dante, 72 who avenged, in vindicative melodies, 
all his private wrongs; or perhaps still more like Montaigne’s 73 
parish priest, who, if a hail-storm passes over the village, 
thinks the day of doom is come, and the cannibals 
already have got the pip. Swedenborg confounds us 
not less with the pains of Melancthon and Wol- 
fius 74 and his own books, which he advertises among the an¬ 
gels. 

Under the same theologic cramp, many of his dogmas are 
bound. His cardinal position in morals is that evils should 
be shunned as sins. But he does not know what evil is, or 
what good is, who thinks any ground remains to be occupied, 
after saying that evil is to be shunned as evil. I doubt not he 
was led by the desire to insert the element of personality of 
Deity. But nothing is added. One man, you say, dreads 
erysipelas, — show him that this dread is evil: or, one 
dreads hell, — show him that dread is evil. He who loves 
goodness, harbors angels, reveres reverence, and lives with 
God. The less we have to do with our sins the better. No 
man can afford to waste his moments in compunctions. 
“That is active duty,” say the Hindoos, “which is not for our' 
bondage; that is knowledge, which is for our liberation: all 
other duty is good only unto weariness.” 

Another dogma, growing out of this pernicious theologic 
limitation, is his Inferno. 75 Swedenborg has devils. Evil, 
according to old philosophers, is good in the making. That 
pure malignity can exist is the extreme proposition of un¬ 
belief. It is not to be entertained by a rational agent; it 
is atheism; it is the last profanation. Euripides 76 rightly 
said, — 

“Goodness and being in the gods are one; 

He who imputes ill to them makes them none.” 


9i 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 

To what a painful perversion had Gothic 77 theology ar¬ 
rived, that Swedenborg admitted no conversion for evil 
spirits! But the divine effort is never relaxed; the carrion 
in the sun will convert itself to grass and flowers; and man, 
though in brothels, or jails, or on gibbets, is on his way to all 
that is good and true. Burns, 78 with the wild humor of his 
apostrophe to poor “auld Nickie Ben,” 

“0 wad ye tak a thought, and mend!” 

has the advantage of the vindictive theologian. Every thing is 
superficial and perishes but love and truth only. The largest is 
always the truest sentiment, and we feel the more generous 
spirit of the Indian Vishm/ 179 — “I am the same to all man¬ 
kind. There is not one who is worthy of my love or hatred. 
They who serve me with adoration, — I am in them, and they 
in me. If one whose ways are altogether evil serve me alone, 
he is as respectable as the just man; he is altogether well 
employed; he soon becometh of a virtuous spirit and ob- 
taineth eternal happiness.” 

For the anomalous pretension of Revelations of the other 
world, — only his probity and genius can entitle it to any 
serious regard. His revelations destroy their credit by run¬ 
ning into detail. If a man say that the Holy Ghost has 
informed him that the Last Judgment (or the last of the judg¬ 
ments), took place in 1757; or that the Dutch, in the other 
world, live in a heaven by themselves, and the English in a 
heaven by themselves; I reply that the Spirit which is holy is 
reserved, taciturn, and deals in laws. The rumors of ghosts 
and hobgoblins gossip and tell fortunes. The teachings of 
high Spirit are abstemious, and, in regard to particulars, 
negative. Socrates’s Genius did not advise him to act or to 
find, but if he purposed to do somewhat not advantageous, it 
dissuaded him. “What God is,” he said, “I know not; what 
he is not, I know.” The Hindoos have denominated the 
Supreme Being, the “Internal Check.” The illuminated 


92 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


Quakers explained their Light, not as somewhat which leads 
to any action, but it appears as an obstruction to any thing 
unfit. But the right examples are private experiences, which 
are absolutely at one on this point. Strictly speaking, Sweden¬ 
borg’s revelation is a confounding of planes, — a capital 
offence in so learned a categorist. This is to carry the law 
of surface into the plane of substance, to carry individualism 
and its fopperies into the realm of essences and generals, — 
which is dislocation and chaos. 

The secret of heaven is kept from age to age. No impru¬ 
dent, no sociable angel ever dropt an early syllable to answer 
the longings of saints, the fears of mortals. We should have 
listened on our knees to any favorite, who, by stricter obedi¬ 
ence, had brought his thoughts into parallelism with the ce¬ 
lestial currents and could hint to human ears the scenery and 
circumstance of the newly parted soul. But it is certain that 
it must tally with what is best in nature. It must not be 
inferior in tone to the already known works of the artist who 
sculptures the globes of the firmament and writes the moral 
law. It must be fresher than rainbows, stabler than moun¬ 
tains, agreeing with flowers, with tides, and the rising and 
setting of autumnal stars. Melodious poets shall be hoarse as 
street ballads when once the penetrating key-note of nature 
and spirit is sounded, — the earth-beat, sea-beat, heart-beat, 
which makes the tune to which the sun rolls, and the globule 
of blood, and the sap of trees. 

In this mood we hear the rumor that the seer has arrived, 
and his tale is told. But there is no beauty, no heaven: for 
angels, goblins. The sad muse loves night and death and the 
pit. His Inferno is mesmeric. His spiritual world bears the 
same relation to the generosities and joys of truth of which 
human souls have already made us cognizant, as a man’s bad 
dreams bear to his ideal life. It is indeed very like, in its 
endless power of lurid pictures, to the phenomena of dreaming, 
which nightly turns many an honest gentleman, benevolent 


93 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 

but dyspeptic, into a wretch, skulking like a dog about the 
outer yards and kennels of creation. When he mounts into the 
heaven, I do not hear its language. A man should not tell 
me that he has walked among the angels; his proof is that his 
eloquence makes me one. Shall the archangels be less ma¬ 
jestic and sweet than the figures that have actually walked 
the earth? These angels that Swedenborg paints give us no 
very high idea of their discipline and culture: they are all 
country parsons: their heaven is a fete champetre , 80 an evangel¬ 
ical picnic, or French distribution of prizes to virtuous peas¬ 
ants. Strange, scholastic, didactic, passionless, bloodless 
man, who denotes classes of souls as a botanist disposes of a 
carex, 81 and visits doleful hells as a stratum of chalk or horn¬ 
blende! 82 He has no sympathy. He goes up and down the 
world of men, a modern Rhadamanthus 83 in gold-headed 
cane and peruke 84 and with nonchalance and the air of a 
referee, distributes souls. The warm, many-weathered, 
passionate-peopled world is to him a grammar of hieroglyphs, 
or an emblematic free-mason’s procession. How different is 
Jacob Behmen! he is tremulous with emotion and listens awe¬ 
struck, with the gentlest humanity, to the Teacher whose 
lessons he conveys; and when he asserts that, “in some sort, 
love is greater than God,” his heart beats so high that the 
thumping against his leathern coat is audible across the 
centuries. ’T is a great difference. Behmen is healthily and 
beautifully wise, notwithstanding the mystical narrowness 
and incommunicableness. Swedenborg is disagreeably wise, 
and with all his accumulated gifts, paralyzes and repels. 

It is the best sign of a great nature that it opens a fore¬ 
ground, and, like the breath of morning landscapes, invites 
us onward. Swedenborg is retrospective, nor can we divest 
him of his mattock and shroud. Some minds are for ever 
restrained from descending into nature; others are for ever 
prevented from ascending out of it. With a force of many 
men, he could never break the umbilical cord which held 


94 EMERSON'S ESSAYS 

him to nature, and he did not rise to the platform of pure 
genius. 

It is remarkable that this man, who, by his perception of 
symbols, saw the poetic construction of things and the primary 
relation of mind to matter, remained entirely devoid of the 
whole apparatus of poetic expression, which that perception 
creates. He knew the grammar and rudiments of the Mother- 
Tongue, — how could he not read off one strain into music? 
Was he like Saadi, 85 who, in his vision, designed to fill his lap 
with the celestial flowers, as presents for his friends; but the 
fragrance of the roses so intoxicated him that the skirt dropped 
from his hands? or is reporting a breach of the manners of 
that heavenly society? or was it that he saw the vision in¬ 
tellectually, and hence that chiding of the intellectual that 
pervades his books? Be it as it may, his books have no mel¬ 
ody, no emotion, no humor, no relief to the dead prosaic level. 
In his profuse and accurate imagery is no pleasure, for there 
is no beauty. We wander forlorn in a lack-lustre landscape. 
No bird ever sang in all these gardens of the dead. The entire 
want of poetry in so transcendent a mind betokens the disease, 
and like a hoarse voice in a beautiful person, is a kind of 
warning. I think, sometimes, he will not be read longer. His 
great name will turn a sentence. His books have become a 
monument. His laurel so largely mixed with cypress, a 
charnel-breath so mingles with the temple incense, that boys 
and maids will shun the spot. 

Yet in this immolation of genius and fame at the shrine of 
conscience is a merit sublime beyond praise. He lived to 
purpose: he gave a verdict. He elected goodness as the clue 
to which the soul must cling in all this labyrinth of nature. 
Many opinons conflict as to the true centre. In the ship¬ 
wreck, some cling to running rigging, some to cask and barrel, 
some to spars, some to mast; the pilot chooses with science, — 

I plant myself here; all will sink before this; “he comes to 
land who sails with me.” 86 Do not rely on heavenly favor, or 



SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 


95 


on compassion to folly, or on prudence, on common sense, the 
old usage and main chance of men: nothing can keep you, — 
not fate, nor health, nor admirable intellect; none can keep 
you, but rectitude only, rectitude for ever and ever! And with 
a tenacity that never swerved in all his studies, inventions, 
dreams, he adheres to this brave choice. I think of him as of 
some transmigrating votary of Indian legend, who says 
“ Though I be dog, or jackal, or pismire, in the last rudiments 
of nature, under what integument or ferocity, I cleave to 
right, as the sure ladder that leads up to man and to God.” 

Swedenborg has rendered a double service to mankind, 
which is now only beginning to be known. By the science of 
experiment and use, he made his first steps: he observed and 
published the laws of nature; and ascending by just degrees 
from events to their summits and causes, he was fired with 
piety at the harmonies he felt, and abandoned himself to his 
joy and worship. This was his first service. If the glory was 
too bright for his eyes to bear, if he staggered under the 
trance of delight, the more excellent is the spectacle he saw, 
the realities of being which beam and blaze through him, and 
which no infirmities of the prophet are suffered to obscure; 
and he renders a second passive service to men, not less than 
the first, perhaps, in the great circle of being, — and, in the 
retributions of spiritual nature, not less glorious or less 
beautiful to himself. 

NOTES 

1 See page 61, note 117. 

2 Probably from the Akhlak-i-Jalaly. See page 57, note 36. 

3 Persons of the highest or sacerdotal class among the Hindoos. 

4 The belief, as of the Buddhist sect, that souls after death 
pass into other earthly existence in the bodies of other persons or 
animals. 

5 A Platonic philosopher of Lycopolis in Egypt ( ca . 205-270 

A.D.). 

6 A Platonic philosopher from Tyre who taught in Alexandria; 
one of the greatest enemies of the Christian religion (233-ca. 
304 A.D.): 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


96 

7 Bunyan, John, English Baptist preacher, author of Pilgrim’s 
Progress (1628-1688). 

8 Fox, George, English Quaker, founder of the Society of 
Friends (1624-1691). 

9 Pascal, Blaise, French divine, philosopher, and mathemati¬ 
cian (1623-1662). 

10 Guy on, Madame Jeanne Marie Bouvier de la Motte, French 
religious writer; expounder of the doctrine of Quietism (1648- 
1717). 

11 From Dryden’s Absolom and Achitophel. Compare Cam¬ 
bridge edition, “And o'er informed the tenement of clay." 

12 Hamlet, I, iv. 

13 Names of Swedish royalty and nobility. 

14 A city not far from Stockholm, Sweden, with a university 
and a cathedral. 

15 Frederikshald is a town of Norway close to the frontier of 
Sweden, where on December 11, 1718, Charles XII of Sweden was 
killed in battle. 

16 A scientific periodical recording mechanical and mathe¬ 
matical inventions and discoveries, published from 1716 to 1718. 

17 King of Sweden and patron of Swedenborg during his early 
career (1682-1718). 

18 The Diet, or Riksdag, in Sweden was a political assembly 
consisting of four distinct orders, nobles, clergy, burgesses, and 
peasants. 

19 Count Hopken, Anders John, Swedish statesman and writer, 
influential in reforming the Swedish language on classical lines 
(1712-1789). 

20 seventh, Uranus; eighth, Neptune. 

21 The theory that all material substances are composed of 
minute particles, or atoms, of a comparatively small number of 
kinds, all the atoms of the same kind being uniform in size, weight, 
and other properites. 

22 Schlichting, Jonas de Bukowic, Polish philosopher, banished 
for his work, Confession of Faith, which was burned as heretical 
(1596-1664). 

23 Monro, Alexander, physician, first of a line of distinguished 
doctors and writers by the same name. Probably the eldest is 
referred to here. He founded the medical school at Edinburgh 
(1697-1767). 

24 Wilson, Sir William James Erasmus, English surgeon and 
author of a system of anatomy (1809-1834). 

25 Selden, John, Jurist, antiquarian, orientalist, author (1584— 

1654)- 

26 Humboldt, Frederic Henry Alexander, Baron von, noted 
traveler and scientist (1769-1859). 

27 Probably refers to a certain extinct monster of the Carbon¬ 
iferous Age known as the Mesosaurus. 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 97 

28 Extinct species of elephants, recognized and named for the 
formation of their molar teeth. 

29 bon mots, “witty remarks.” 

30 Harvey, William, English physician, discoverer of the cir¬ 
culation of the blood (1578-1687). 

31 Gilbert , William, English physician and scientist, discoverer 
of some of the properties of the magnet (1540-1603). 

32 Descartes , French philosopher and mathematician (1596- 
i 6 5 °). 

33 Malpighi , Marcello, of Bologna, Italian physician and scien¬ 
tist, founder of microscopic anatomy (1628-1694). 

34 The most eminent ancient doctor, often called the “Father 
of Medicine” (460-359 or 377? b.c.). 

35 A Greek philosopher who held the atomic theory, teacher of 
Democritus, who apparently carried on his views (fifth century 
B.C.). 

36 Lucretius, Latin philosophic poet. His greatest work was the 
De Rerum Natura ( ca . 96-55 b.c.). 

37 Swammerdam, Jan, Dutch scientist, naturalist and ex¬ 
perimenter, noted for the minute study of the internal organs 
(1637-1680). 

38 Leuwenhoek, Anthony de, Dutch physician, noted for his 
discoveries with the microscope, especially with regard to the 
circulatory system (1632-1723). 

39 Winslow, James Benignus, Danish anatomist, specialist in 
descriptive anatomy (1669-1760). 

40 Eustachius, Bartolommeo, eminent Italian anatomist and 
writer. Died 1574. 

41 Heister , Lorenz, author of various books on surgery (1683- 
1758 ). 

42 Belgian anatomist of great distinction, whose work did 
much to establish the science of modern surgery (1514-1564). 

43 Boerhaave, Herman, Dutch physician and philosopher 
(1668-1738). 

44 Linnceus, Carl von, Swedish botanist, said to be the origi¬ 
nator of the modern botanical science (1707-1778). 

45 Leibnitz, Gottfried Wilhelm, Baron von, German philoso¬ 
pher and mathematician of great distinction; author of numerous 
philosophical works (1646-1716). 

46 German philosopher and mathematician (1679-1754). 

47 Grotius, Hugo, distinguished Dutch jurist and theologian 

(1583-1645). ... , , t , 

48 One from the Scandinavian pirate crews that plundered the 
coasts of Europe in the middle ages. The word is derived from 
the Anglo-Saxon wicing, “camper” or “villager,” and has no 
connection with the modern word “king,” as is popularly be¬ 
lieved. 

49 Statisticians; a rare use of the word. 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


98 


50 Mr. Wilkinson (James John Garth), English jurist and mys¬ 
tic, editor of Swedenborg, member of the Swedenborg Society for 
promoting the publication of Swedenborg’s writings (1812-1899). 

61 Mr. Clissold, (Augustus Clissold), English clergyman, 
member of the Swedenborg Society, forwarded the publication of 
Swedenborg’s writings, translated and printed some at his own 
expense ( ca . 1797-1882). 

62 King of Egypt, a character mentioned by Plutarch (sixth 
century, B.C.). 

63 From the De Rerum Natura, Book I, 1 . 835 f. 

64 One of Swedenborg’s theological works. 

65 Son of Oceanus and Tethys; so-named because of his abil¬ 
ity to transform himself into various animals in order to escape 
answering questions; supposed to be a prophet. 

66 Aberration of the mind. 

57 A great lawgiver of Sparta (about ninth century B.C.). 

58 Roman poet (43 B.C.-17 A.D.). 

69 A beautiful singer; a friend of the poet Dante. 

60 Rudeness, barbarousness, inelegance. 

61 Rabelais , Francois, French author, noted for his humor and 
satire; famous for his giant mock-heroes, Gargantua and Panta- 
gruel {ca. 1490-1553). 

62 Dean Swift, Jonathan, the dean of St. Patrick’s Cathedral 
in Dublin, English satirist, author of Gulliver's Travels, etc. 
(1667-1745). 

63 Most sacred and solemn of all the festivals celebrated by the 
Greeks. 

84 Aged ferryman who carried dead souls across the Styx 
River in Hades. 

66 Irish physician and naturalist of Scottish extraction, presi¬ 
dent of the Royal Society and physician to George I. He be¬ 
queathed his collection of curiosities to the public, and it formed 
the basis of the British Museum (1660-1752). 

66 Founder of the Mohammedan religion, (571-632). 

67 Cicero, Marcus Tullius, Roman orator, philosopher, and 
statesman (106-43 b.c.). 

68 French soi, meaning “oneself,” and disant, from the verb, 
“to say”; self-styled. Hence, “pretended,” “would-be.” 

69 Luther, Martin, leader of the German Reformation (1483- 
1546 ). 

70 Melancthon, Philip, reformer and co-worker with Luther in 
the German Reformation (1497-1560). 

71 Michael Angelo. See page 62, note 140. 

72 Dante, Alighieri, the foremost Italian poet. His most im¬ 
portant work is the Commcedia, popularly known as the Divine 
Comedy (1265-1321). 

73 Montaigne, Michel Eyquem de, French author (1533-1592). 

74 Wolfius. See note on Christian Wolff, note 46. 


SWEDENBORG; OR THE MYSTIC 99 

75 Hell. The word usually refers to the Inferno of Dante’s 
Divine Comedy. 

76 Greek tragic poet; modernized drama to deal with human 
suffering (480-406 b.c.). 

77 Mediaeval, pertaining to the dark ages. 

78 Burns , Robert, Scottish poet (1759-1796). 

79 Second deity of the Hindoo trinity; the preserver who several 
times has taken human form to save mankind from some great 
evil. 

80 Open-air festival. 

81 A botanical term designating plants of the sedge family. 

82 A variety of mineral. 

83 A mythical character, the son of Jupiter and Europa, who 
reigned over some of the Cyclades and Greek cities in Asia with 
such justice that the ancients have said that he became one of 
the judges in Hades. 

84 A kind of wig introduced into England in the time of Charles 

II. 

85 Persian poet ( ca. 1184-1291). 

86 From N. P. Willis’s poem Lines on Leaving Europe. It 
should read, “He comes to shore who sails with me.” See 
Emerson’s Parnassus. 


IV 


MONTAIGNE ; 1 OR, THE SKEPTIC 2 

T? VERY fact is related on one side to sensation, and on the 
other to morals. The game of thought is, on the appear¬ 
ance of one of these two sides, to find the other: given the up¬ 
per, to find the under side. Nothing so thin but has these two 
faces, and when the observer has seen the obverse, he turns it 
over to see the reverse. Life is a pitching of this penny, — 
heads or tails. We never tire of this game, because there is 
still a slight shudder of astonishment at the exhibition of the 
other face, at the contrast of the two faces. A man is flushed 
with success, and bethinks himself what this good luck sig¬ 
nifies. He drives his bargain in the street; but it occurs that 
he also is bought and sold. He sees the beauty of a human 
face, and searches the cause of that beauty, which must be 
more beautiful. He builds his fortunes, maintains the laws, 
cherishes his children; but he asks himself, "Why? and 
whereto?” This head and this tail are called, in the language 
of philosophy, Infinite and Finite; Relative and Absolute; 
Apparent and Real; and many fine names beside. 

Each man is born with a predisposition to one or the other of 
these sides of nature; and it will easily happen that men will 
be found devoted to one or the other. One class has the per¬ 
ception of difference, and is conversant with facts and surfaces, 
cities and persons, and the bringing certain things to pass; — 
the men of talent and action. Another class have the per¬ 
ception of identity, and are men of faith and philosophy, men 
of genius. 


ioo 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC ioi 

Each of these riders drives too fast. Plotinus 3 believes 
only in philosophers; Fenelon, 4 in saints; Pindar 5 and Byron, 6 
in poets. Read the haughty language in which Plato and the 
Plantonists speak of all men who are not devoted to their 
own shining abstractions: other men are rats and mice. The 
literary class is usually proud and exclusive. The corre¬ 
spondence of Pope 7 and Swift 8 describes mankind around 
them as monsters; and that of Goethe 9 and Schiller, 10 in our 
own time, is scarcely more kind. 

It is easy to see how this arrogance comes. The genius is a 
genius by the first look he casts on any object. Is his eye 
creative? Does he not rest in angles and colors, but beholds 
the design? — he will presently undervalue the actual object. 
In powerful moments, his thought has dissolved the works of 
art and nature into their causes, so that the works appear 
heavy and faulty. He has a conception of beauty which the 
sculptor cannot embody. Picture, statue, temple, railroad, 
steam-engine, existed first in an artist’s mind, without flaw, 
mistake, or friction, which impair the executed models. So 
did the Church, the State, college, court, social circles, and 
all the institutions. It is not strange that these men, re¬ 
membering what they have seen and hoped of ideas, should 
affirm disdainfully the superiority of ideas. Having at some 
time seen that the happy soul will carry all the arts in power, 
they say, “Why cumber ourselves with superfluous realiza¬ 
tions?” and like dreaming beggars they assume to speak and 
act as if these values were already substantiated. 

On the other part, the men of toil and trade and luxury, — 
the animal world, including the animal in the philosopher and 
poet also, and the practical world, including the painful 
drudgeries which are never excused to philosopher or poet any 
more than to the rest, — weigh heavily on the other side. 
The trade in our streets believes in no metaphysical causes, 
thinks nothing of the force which necessitated traders and a 
trading planet to exist: no, but sticks to cotton, sugar, wool, 


102 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


and salt. The ward meetings, on election days, are not sof¬ 
tened by any misgiving of the value of these ballotings. Hot 
life is streaming in a single direction. To the men of practical 
power, whilst immersed in it, the man of ideas appears out of 
his reason. They alone have reason. 

Things always bring their own philosphy with them, that is 
prudence. No man acquires property without acquiring with 
it a little arithmetic also. In England, the richest country 11 
that ever existed, property stands for more, compared with 
personal ability, than in any other. After dinner, a man 
believes less, denies more: verities have lost some charm. 
After dinner, arithmetic is the only science: ideas are dis¬ 
turbing, incendiary, follies of young men, repudiated by 
the solid portion of society: and a man comes to be valued by 
his athletic and animal qualities. Spence 12 relates that 
Mr. Pope was with Sir Godfrey Kneller 13 one day, when his 
nephew, a Guinea trader, came in. “Nephew,” said Sir 
Godfrey, “you have the honor of seeing the two greatest men 
in the world.” “I don’t know how great men you may be,” 
said the Guinea man, “but I don’t like your looks. I have 
often bought a man much better than both of you, all muscles 
and bones, for ten guineas.” Thus the men of the senses 
revenge themselves on the professors and repay scorn for 
scorn. The first had leaped to conclusions not yet ripe, 
and say more than is true; others make themselves merry 
with the philosopher, and weigh man by the pound. They 
believe that mustard bites the tongue, that pepper is hot, 
friction-matches incendiary, revolvers are to be avoided, and 
suspenders hold up pantaloons; that there is much sentiment 
in a chest of tea; and a man will be eloquent, if you give him 
good wine. Are you tender and scrupulous, — you must eat 
more mince-pie. They hold that Luther had milk in him when 
he said, — 

“Wer nicht liebt Wein, Weiber, Gesang, 14 
Der bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang;’’ — 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 103 

and when he advised a young scholar, perplexed with fore¬ 
ordination and free-will, to get well drunk. “The nerves,” 
says Cabanis, 15 “they are the man.” My neighbor, a jolly 
farmer, in the tavern bar-room, thinks that the use of money 
is sure and speedy spending. For his part, he says, he puts 
his down his neck and gets the good of it. 

The inconvenience of this way of thinking is that it runs 
into indifferentism and then into disgust. Life is eating us up. 
We shall be fables presently. Keep cool: it will be all one a 
hundred years hence. Life’s well enough, but we shall be 
glad to get out of it, and they will all be glad to have us. Why 
should we fret and drudge? Our meat will taste tomorrow as 
it did yesterday, and we may at last have had enough of it. 
“Ah,” said my languid gentleman at Oxford, “there’s nothing 
new or true, — and no matter.” 

With a little more bitterness, the cynic moans; our life is 
like an ass led to market by a bundle of hay being carried 
before him; he sees nothing but the bundle of hay. “There 
is so much trouble in coming into the world,” said Lord 
Bolingbroke, 16 “and so much more, as well as meanness, in 
going out of it, that’t is hardly worth while to be here at all.” 
I knew a philosopher of this kidney who was accustomed 
briefly to sum up his experience of human nature in saying, 
“Mankind is a damned rascal”: and the natural corollary is 
pretty sure to follow, — “The world lives by humbug, and so 
will I.” 

The abstractionist and the materialist thus mutually ex¬ 
asperating each other, and the scoffer expressing the worst of 
materialism, there arises a third party to occupy the middle 
ground between these two, the skeptic, namely. He finds 
both wrong by being in extremes. He labors to plant his feet, 
to be the beam of the balance. He will not go beyond his card. 
He sees the one-sidedness of these men of the street; he will 
not be a Gibeonite; 17 he stands for the intellectual faculties, a 
cool head and whatever serves to keep it cool; no unadvised 


104 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


industry, no unrewarded self-devotion, no loss of the brains 
in toil. Am I an ox, or a dray? — “You are both in extremes,” 
he says. “You that will have all solid, and a world of pig- 
lead, deceive yourselves grossly. You believe yourselves 
rooted and grounded on adamant; and yet, if we uncover the 
last facts of our knowledge, you are spinning like bubbles in 
a river, you know not whither or whence, and you are bot¬ 
tomed and capped and wrapped in delusions.” Neither will 
he be betrayed to a book and wrapped in a gown. The 
studious class are their own victims; they are thin and pale, 
their feet are cold, their heads are hot, the night is without 
sleep, the day a fear of interruption, — pallor, squalor, hunger, 
and egotism. If you come near them and see what conceits 
they entertain, — they are abstractionists, and spend their 
days and nights in dreaming some dream; in expecting the 
homage of society to some precious scheme, built on a truth, 
but destitute of proportion in its presentment, of justness in 
its application, and of all energy of will in the schemer to 
embody and vitalize it. 

“But I see plainly,” he says, “that I cannot see. I know 
that human strength is not in extremes, but in avoiding ex¬ 
tremes. I, at least, will shun the weakness of philosophizing 
beyond my depth. What is the use of pretending to powers 
we have not? What is the use of pretending to assurances we 
have not, respecting the other life? Why exaggerate the 
power of virtue? Why be an angel before your time? These 
strings, wound up too high, will snap. If there is a wish for 
immortality, and no evidence, why not say just that? If 
there are conflicting evidences, why not state them? If there 
is not ground for a candid thinker to make up his mind, yea 
or nay, — why not suspend the judgment? I weary of these 
dogmatizers. I tire of these hacks of routine, who deny the 
dogmas. I neither affirm nor deny. I stand here to try the 
case. I am here to consider, (TKoirelv, 1 * to consider how it is. 

I will try to keep the balance true. Of what use to take the 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 105 

chair and glibly rattle off theories of society, religion, and 
nature, when I know that practical objections lie in the way, 
insurmountable by me and by my mates? Why so talkative 
in public, when each of my neighbors can pin me to my seat 
by arguments I cannot refute? Why pretend that life is so 
simple a game, when we know how subtle and elusive the 
Proteus 19 is? Why think to shut up all things in your narrow 
coop, when we know there are not one or two only, but ten, 
twenty, a thousand things, and unlike? Why fancy that you 
have all the truth in your keeping? There is much to say on 
all sides.” 

Who shall forbid a wise skepticism, seeing that there is no 
practical question on which any thing more than an approxi¬ 
mate solution can be had? Is not marriage an open question, 
when it is alleged, from the beginning of the world, that such 
as are in the institution wish to get out, and such as are out 
wish to get in? And the reply of Socrates, to him who asked 
whether he should choose a wife, still remains reasonable, 
that “whether he should choose one or not, he would repent 
it.” Is not the State a question? All society is divided in 
opinion on the subject of the State. Nobody loves it; great 
numbers dislike it and suffer conscientious scruples to alle¬ 
giance ; and the only defence set up, is the fear of doing worse 
in disorganizing. Is it otherwise with the Church? Or, to put 
any of the questions which touch mankind nearest, — shall 
the young man aim at a leading part in law, in politics, in 
trade? It will not be pretended that a success in either of 
these kinds is quite coincident with what is best and inmost 
in his mind. Shall he then, cutting the stays that hold him 
fast to the social state, put out to sea with no guidance but 
his genius? There is much to say on both sides. Remember 
the open question between the present order of “competition” 
and the friends of “attractive and associated labor.” The 
generous minds embrace the proposition of labor shared by 
all; it is the only honesty; nothing else is safe. It is from 


io6 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


the poor man’s hut alone that strength and virtue come: 
and yet, on the other side, it is alleged that labor impairs 
the form and breaks the spirit of man, and the laborers cry 
unanimously, “We have no thoughts.” Culture, how in¬ 
dispensable! I cannot forgive you the want of accomplish¬ 
ments; and yet culture will instantly impair that chiefest 
beauty of spontaneousness. Excellent is culture for a savage; 
but once let him read in the book, and he is no longer able 
not to think of Plutarch’s heroes. 20 In short, since true 
fortitude of understanding consists “in not letting what we 
know be embarrassed by what we do not know,” we ought to 
secure those advantages which we can command, and not risk 
them by clutching after the airy and unattainable. Come, no 
chimeras! Let us go abroad; let us mix in affairs; let us 
learn and get and have and climb. “ Men are a sort of moving 
plants, and, like trees, receive a great part of their nourish¬ 
ment from the air. If they keep too much at home, they 
pine.” Let us have a robust, manly life; let us know what 
we know, for certain; what we have, let it be solid and 
seasonable and our own. A world in the hand is worth two in 
the bush. Let us have to do with real men and women, and 
not with skipping ghosts. 

This then is the right ground of the skeptic, — this of con¬ 
sideration, of self-containing; not at all of unbelief; not at all 
of universal denying, nor of universal doubting, — doubting 
even that he doubts; least of all of scoffing and profligate 
jeering at all that is stable and good. These are no more his 
moods than are those of religion and philosophy. He is the 
considerer, the prudent, taking in sail, counting stock, hus¬ 
banding his means, believing that a man has too many ene¬ 
mies than that he can afford to be his own foe; that we 
cannot give ourselves too many advantages in this unequal 
conflict, with powers so vast and unweariable ranged on one 
side, and this little conceited vulnerable popinjay that a man 
is, bobbing up and down into every danger, on the other. It is 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 107 

a position taken up for better defence, as of more safety, and 
one that can be maintained; and it is one of more opportunity 
and range: as, when we build a house, the rule is to set it not 
too high nor too low, under the wind, but out of the dirt. 

The philosophy we want is one of fluxions and mobility. 
The Spartan and Stoic schemes 21 are too stark and stiff for 
our occasion. A theory of Saint John, and of nonresistance, 22 
seems, on the other hand, too thin and aerial. We want some 
coat woven of elastic steel, stout as the first and limber as the 
second. We want a ship in these billows we inhabit. An 
angular, dogmatic house would be rent to chips and splinters 
in this storm of many elements. No, it must be tight, and 
fit to the form of man, to live at all; as a shell must dictate 
the architecture of a house founded on the sea. The soul of 
man must be the type of our scheme, just as the body of man 
is the type after which a dwelling-house is built. Adaptive¬ 
ness is the peculiarity of human nature. We are golden 
averages, volitant stabilities, compensated or periodic errors, 
houses founded on the sea. The wise skeptic wishes to have a 
near view of the best game and the chief players; what is best 
in the planet; art and nature, places and events; but mainly 
men. Every thing that is excellent in mankind, — a form of 
grace, an arm of iron, lips of persuasion, a brain of resources, 
every one skilful to play and win, — he will see and judge. 

The terms of admission to this spectacle are, that he have 
a certain solid and intelligible way of living of his own; some 
method of answering the inevitable needs of human life; 
proof that he has played with skill and success; that he has 
evinced the temper, stoutness, and the range of qualities 
which, among his contemporaries and countrymen, entitle 
him to fellowship and trust. For the secrets of life are not 
shown except to sympathy and likeness. Men do not confide 
themselves to boys, or coxcombs, or pedants, but to their 
peers. Some wise limitation, as the modern phrase is; some 
condition between the extremes, and having, itself, a positive 


108 EMERSON'S ESSAYS 

quality; some stark and sufficient man, who is not salt or 
sugar, but sufficiently related to the world to do justice to 
Paris or London, and, at the same time, a vigorous and origi¬ 
nal thinker, whom cities can not overawe, but who uses them, 
— is the fit person to occupy this ground of speculation. 

These qualities meet in the character of Montaigne. And 
yet, since the personal regard which I entertain for Montaigne 
may be unduly great, I will, under the shield of this prince of 
egotists, offer, as an apology for electing him as the represent¬ 
ative of skepticism, a word or two to explain how my love 
began and grew for this admirable gossip. 

A single odd volume of Cotton’s translation 23 of the Essays 
remained to me from my father’s library, when a boy. It lay 
long neglected, until, after many years, when I was newly es¬ 
caped from college, I read the book, and procured the remain¬ 
ing volumes. I remember the delight and wonder in which I 
lived with it. It seemed to me as if I had myself written the 
book, in some former life, so sincerely it spoke of my thought 
and experience. It happened, when in Paris, in 1833, that, 
in the cemetery of Pere Lachaise, 24 I came to a tomb of 
Auguste Collignon, who died in 1830, aged sixty-eight years, 
and who, said the monument, “lived to do right, and had 
formed himself to virtue on the Essays of Montaigne.” 
Some years later, I became acquainted with an accomplished 
English poet, John Sterling; 25 and, in prosecuting my cor¬ 
respondence, I found that, from a love of Montaigne, he had 
made a pilgrimage to his chateau, still standing near Castellan, 
in Perigord, 26 and, after two hundred and fifty years, had 
copied from the walls of his library the inscriptions which 
Montaigne had written there. That Journal of Mr. Sterling’s, 
published in the Westminster Review, Mr. Hazlitt 27 has 
reprinted in the Prolegomena to his edition of the Essays. 

I heard with pleasure that one of the newly-discovered auto¬ 
graphs of William Shakspeare was in a copy of Florio’s 
translation 28 of Montaigne. It is the only book which we 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 109 

certainly know to have been in the poet’s library. And, oddly 
enough, the duplicate copy of Florio, which the British Mu¬ 
seum purchased with a view of protecting the Shakspeare 
autograph, (as I was informed in the Museum,) turned out 
to have the autograph of Ben Jonson 29 in the fly-leaf. Leigh 
Hunt 30 relates of Lord Byron, that Montaigne was the only 
great writer of past times whom he read with avowed satis¬ 
faction. Other coincidences, not needful to be mentioned 
here, concurred to make this old Gascon 31 still new and im¬ 
mortal for me. 

In 1571, on the death of his father, Montaigne, then thirty- 
eight years old, retired from the practice of law at Bordeaux, 
and settled himself on his estate. Though he had been a man 
of pleasure -and sometimes a courtier, his studious habits now 
grew on him, and he loved the compass, staidness, and in¬ 
dependence of the country gentleman’s life. He took up his 
economy in good earnest, and made his farms yield the most. 
Downright and plain-dealing, and abhorring to be deceived or 
to deceive, he was esteemed in the country for his sense and 
probity. In the civil wars of the League, 32 which converted 
every house into a fort, Montaigne kept his gates open and 
his house without defence. All parties freely came and went, 
his courage and honor being universally esteemed. The neigh¬ 
boring lords and gentry brought jewels and papers to him for 
safe-keeping. Gibbon 33 reckons, in these bigoted times, but 
two men of liberality in France, — Henry IV. 34 and Mon¬ 
taigne. 

Montaigne is the frankest and honestest of all writers. 
His French freedom runs into grossness; but he has antici¬ 
pated all censure by the bounty of his own confessions. In his 
times, books were written to one sex only, and almost all were 
written in Latin; so that in a humorist a certain nakedness of 
statement was permitted, which our manners, of a literature 
addressed equally to both sexes, do not allow. But though a 
biblical plainness coupled with a most uncanonical levity 


no 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


may shut his pages to many sensitive readers, yet^the offence 
is superficial. He parades it: he makes the most of it: nobody 
can think or say worse of him than he does. He pretends to 
most of the vices; and, if there be any virtue in him, he says, 
it got in by stealth. There is no man, in his opinion, who has 
not deserved hanging five or six times; and he pretends no 
exception in his own behalf. “Five or six as ridiculous 
stories,” too, he says, “can be told of me, as of any man liv¬ 
ing.” But, with all this really superfluous frankness, the 
opinion of an invincible probity grows into every reader’s 
mind. “When I the most strictly and religiously confess 
myself, I find that the best virtue I have has in it some 
tincture of vice; and I, who am as sincere and perfect a lover 
of virtue of that stamp as any other whatever, am afraid that 
Plato, in his purest virtue, if he had listened and laid his 
ear close to himself, would have heard some jarring sound of 
human mixture; but faint and remote and only to be per¬ 
ceived by himself.” 

Here is an impatience and fastidiousness at color or pretence 
of any kind. He has been in courts so long as to have con¬ 
ceived a furious disgust at appearances; he will indulge himself 
with a little cursing and swearing; he will talk with sailors and 
gipsies, use flash and street ballads; he has stayed in-doors 
till he is deadly sick; he will to the open air, though it rain 
bullets. He has seen too much of gentlemen of the long 
robe, 35 until he wishes for cannibals; and is so nervous, by 
factitious life, that he thinks the more barbarous man is, the 
better he is. He likes his saddle. You may read theology, 
and grammar, and metaphysics elsewhere. Whatever you 
get here shall smack of the earth and of real life, sweet, or 
smart, or stinging. He makes no hesitation to entertain you 
with the records of his disease, and his journey to Italy is 
quite full of that matter. He took and kept this position of 
equilibrium. Over his name he drew an emblematic pair of 
scales, and wrote Que sqais je? 36 under it. As I look at his 


Ill 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 

effigy opposite the title-page, I seem to hear him say, “You 
may play old Poz, 37 if you will; you may rail and exaggerate, 
— I stand here for truth, and will not, for all the states and 
churches and revenues and personal reputations of Europe, 
overstate the dry fact, as I see it; I will rather mumble and 
prose about what I certainly know, — my house and barns; 
my father, my wife, and my tenants; my old lean bald pate; 
my knives and forks; what meats I eat and what drinks I 
prefer, and a hundred straws just as ridiculous, — than I will 
write, with a fine crow-quill, a fine romance. I like gray days, 
and autumn and winter weather. I am gray and autumnal 
myself, and think an undress and old shoes that do not pinch 
my feet, and old friends who do not constrain me, and plain 
topics where I do not need to strain myself and pump my 
brains, the most suitable. Our condition as men is risky 
and ticklish enough. One cannot be sure of himself and his 
fortune an hour, but he may be whisked off into some pitiable 
or ridiculous plight. Why should I vapor and play the philos¬ 
opher, instead of ballasting, the best I can, this dancing 
balloon? So, at least, I live within compass, keep myself 
ready for action, and can shoot the gulf at last with decency. 
If there be any thing farcical in such a life, the blame is not 
mine: let it lie at fate’s and nature’s door.” 

The Essays, therefore, are an entertaining soliloquy on 
every random topic that comes into his head; treating every 
thing without ceremony, yet with masculine sense. There 
have been men with deeper insight; but, one would say, 
never a man with such abundance of thoughts: he is never 
dull, never insincere, and has the genius to make the reader 
care for all that he cares for. 

The sincerity and marrow of the man reaches to his 
sentences. I know not anywhere the book that seems less 
written. It is the language of conversation transferred to a 
book. Cut these words, and they would bleed; they are 
vascular and alive. One has the same pleasure in it that he 


112 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


feels in listening to the necessary speech of men about their 
work, when any unusual circumstance gives momentary 
importance to the dialogue. For blacksmiths and teamsters 
do not trip in their speech; it is a shower of bullets. It is 
Cambridge men who correct themselves and begin again at 
every half sentence, and, moreover, will pun, and refine too 
much, and swerve from the matter to the expression. Mon¬ 
taigne talks with shrewdness, knows the world and books 
and himself, and used the positive degree; never shrieks, or 
protests, or prays: no weakness, no convulsion, no superla¬ 
tive: does not wish to jump out of his skin, or play any antics, 
or annihilate space or time, but is stout and solid; tastes every 
moment of the day; likes pain because it makes him feel 
himself and realize things; as we pinch ourselves to know that 
we are awake. He keeps the plain; he rarely mounts or sinks; 
likes to feel solid ground and the stones underneath. His 
writing has no enthusiasms, no aspiration; contented, self- 
respecting, and keeping the middle of the road. There is but 
one exception, — in his love for Socrates. In speaking* of 
him, for once his cheek flushes and his style rises to passion. 

Montaigne died of a quinsy, at the age of sixty, in 1592. 
When he came to die he caused the mass to be celebrated in 
his chamber. At the age of thirty-three, he had been married. 
“But,” he says, “might I have had my own will, I would not 
have married Wisdom herself, if she would have had me: 
but’t is to much purpose to evade it, the common custom and 
use of life will have it so. Most of my actions are guided by 
example, not choice.” In the hour of death, he gave the same 
weight to custom. Que sqaisje? What do I know? 

This book of Montaigne the world has endorsed by trans¬ 
lating it into all tongues and printing seventy-five editions of 
it in Europe; and that, too, a circulation somewhat chosen, 
namely among courtiers, soldiers, princes, men of the world, 
and men of wit and generosity. 

Shall we say that Montaigne has spoken wisely, and given 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 113 

the right and permanent expression of the human mind, on 
the conduct of life? 

We are natural believers. Truth, or the connection between 
cause and effect, alone interests us. We are persuaded that a 
thread runs through all things: all worlds are strung on it, 
as beads; and men, and events, and life, come to us only 
because of that thread: they pass and repass only that we 
may know the direction and continuity of that line. A book 
or statement which goes to show that there is no line, but 
random and chaos, a calamity out of nothing, a prosperity 
and no account of it, a hero born from a fool, a fool from a hero, 
— dispirits us. Seen or unseen, we believe the tie exists. 
Talent makes counterfeit ties; genius finds the real ones. We 
hearken to the man of science, because we anticipate the 
sequence in natural phenomena which he uncovers. We love 
• whatever affirms, connects, preserves; and dislike what scat¬ 
ters or pulls down. One man appears whose nature is to all 
men’s eyes conserving and constructive: his presence supposes 
a well-ordered society, agriculture, trade, large institutions, 
and empire. If these did not exist, they would begin to exist 
through his endeavors. Therefore he cheers and comforts 
men, who feel all this in him very readily. The nonconform¬ 
ist and the rebel say all manner of unanswerable things 
against the existing republic, but discover to our sense no plan 
of house or state of their own. Therefore, though the town 
and state and way of living, which our counsellor contem¬ 
plated, might be a very modest or musty prosperity, yet men 
rightly go for him, and reject the reformer so long as he comes 
only with axe and crowbar. 

But though we are natural conservers and causationists and 
reject a sour, dumpish unbelief, the skeptical class, which 
Montaigne represents, have reason, and every man, at some 
time, belongs to it. Every superior mind will pass through 
this domain of equilibration, — I should rather say, will 
know how to avail himself of the checks and balances in 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


114 

nature, as a natural weapon against the exaggeration and 
formalism of bigots and blockheads. 

Skepticism is the attitude assumed by the student in 
relation to the particulars which society adores, but which 
he sees to be reverend only in their tendency and spirit. The 
ground occupied by the skeptic is the vestibule of the temple. 
Society does not like to have any breath of question blown 
on the existing order. But the interrogation of custom at all 
points is an inevitable stage in the growth of every superior 
mind, and is the evidence of its perception of the flowing 
power which remains itself in all changes. 

The superior mind will find itself equally at odds with the 
evils of society and with the projects that are offered to re¬ 
lieve them. The wise skeptic is a bad citizen; no conserva¬ 
tive, he sees the selfishness of property and the drowsiness of 
institutions. But neither is he fit to work with any demo¬ 
cratic party that ever was constituted; for parties wish every 
one committed, and he penetrates the popular patriotism. 
His politics are those of the “Soul’s Errand” of Sir Walter 
Raleigh; 38 or of Krishna, in the Bhagavat, 39 “There is none 
who is worthy of my love or hatred”; whilst he sentences 
law, physic, divinity, commerce, and custom. He is a re¬ 
former; yet he is no better member of the philanthropic asso¬ 
ciation. It turns out that he is not the champion of the 
operative, the pauper, the prisoner, the slave. It stands in 
his mind that our life in this world is not of quite so easy inter¬ 
pretation as churches and school-books say. He does not 
wish to take ground against these benevolences, to play the 
part of devil’s attorney, and blazon every doubt and sneer 
that darkens the sun for him. But he says, “There are 
doubts.” 

I mean to use the occasion, and celebrate the calendar-day 
of our Saint Michel de Montaigne, by counting and describing 
these doubts or negations. I wish to ferret them out of their 
holes and sun them a little. We must do with them as the 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 115 

police do with old rogues, who are shown up to the public at 
the marshal’s office. They will never be so formidable when 
once they have been identified and registered. But I mean 
honestly by them, — that justice shall be done to their 
terrors. I shall not take Sunday objections, made up on pur¬ 
pose to be put down. I shall take the worst I can find, whether 
I can dispose of them or they of me. 

I do not press the skepticism of the materialist. I know the 
quadruped opinion will not prevail. ’T is of no importance 
what bats and oxen think. The first dangerous symptom I 
report is, the levity of intellect; as if it were fatal to earnest¬ 
ness to know much. Knowledge is the knowing that we can 
not know. The dull pray; the geniuses are light mockers. 
How respectable is earnestness on every platform! but in¬ 
tellect kills it. Nay, San Carlo, 40 my subtle and admirable 
friend, one of the most penetrating of men, finds that all 
direct ascension, even of lofty piety, leads to this ghastly 
insight and sends back the votary orphaned. My astonishing 
San Carlo thought the lawgivers and saints infected. They 
found the ark empty; saw, and would not tell; and tried to 
choke off their approaching followers, by saying, “Action, 
action, my dear fellows, is for you!” Bad as was to me this 
detection by San Carlo, this frost in July, this blow from a 
bride, there was still a worse, namely the cloy or satiety of 
the saints. In the mount of vision, ere they have yet risen 
from their knees, they say, “We discover that this our homage 
and beatitude is partial and deformed: we must fly for relief 
to the suspected and reviled Intellect, to the Understanding, 
the Mephistopheles, 41 to the gymnastics of talent.” 

This is hobgoblin 42 the first; and, though it has been the 
subject of much elegy in our nineteenth century, from Byron, 
Goethe, and other poets of less fame, not to mention many 
distinguished private observers, — I confess it is not very 
affecting to my imagination; for it seems to concern the 
shattering of baby-houses and crockery-shops. What flutters 


ii6 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


the Church of Rome, or of England, or of Geneva, 43 or of 
Boston, may yet be very far from touching any principle of 
faith. I think that the intellect and moral sentiment are 
unanimous; and that though philosophy extirpates bugbears, 
yet it supplies the natural checks of vice, and polarity to the 
soul. I think that the wiser a man is, the more stupendous he 
finds the natural and moral economy, and lifts himself to a 
more absolute reliance. 

There is the power of moods, each setting at nought all but 
its own tissue of facts and beliefs. There is the power of com¬ 
plexions, obviously modifying the dispositions and sentiments. 
The beliefs and unbeliefs appear to be structural; and as soon 
as each man attains the pose and vivacity which allow the 
whole machinery to play, he will not need extreme examples, 
but will rapidly alternate all opinions in his own life. Our 
life is March weather, savage and serene in one hour. We 
go forth austere, dedicated, believing in the iron links of 
Destiny, and will not turn on our heel to save our life: but a 
book, or a bust, or only the sound of a name, shoots a spark 
through the nerves, and we suddenly believe in will: my 
finger-ring shall be the seal of Solomon; fate is for imbeciles; 
all is possible to the resolved mind. Presently a new experi¬ 
ence gives a new turn to our thoughts: common sense resumes 
its tyranny; we say, “Well, the army, after all, is the gate 
to fame, manners and poetry: and, look you, — on the whole, 
selfishness plants best, prunes best, makes the best commerce 
and the best citizen.” Are the opinions of a man on right and 
wrong, on fate and causation, at the mercy of a broken sleep 
or an indigestion? Is his belief in God and Duty no deeper 
than a stomach evidence? And what guaranty for the per¬ 
manence of his opinions? I like not the French celerity, — 
a new Church and State once a week. This is the second ne¬ 
gation; and I shall let it pass for what it will. As far as it 
asserts rotation of states of mind, I suppose it suggests its 
own remedy, namely in the record of larger periods. What 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 117 

is the mean of many states; of all the states? Does the gen¬ 
eral voice of ages affirm any principle, or is no community of 
sentiment discoverable in distant times and places? And 
when it shows the power of self-interest, I accept that as part 
of the divine law and must reconcile it with aspiration the 
best I can. 

The word Fate, or Destiny, expresses the sense of man¬ 
kind, in all ages, that the laws of the world do not always be¬ 
friend, but often hurt and crush us. Fate, in the shape of 
Kinde or nature, grows over us like grass. We paint Time 
with a scythe; Love and Fortune, blind; and Destiny, deaf. 
We have too little power of resistance against this ferocity 
which champs us up. What front can we make against these 
unavoidable, victorious, maleficent forces? What can I do 
against the influence of Race, in my history? What can I do 
against hereditary and constitutional habits; against scrofula, 
lymph, impotence? against climate, against barbarism, in my 
country? I can reason down or deny every thing, except this 
perpetual Belly: feed he must and will, and I cannot make him 
respectable. 

But the main resistance which the affirmative impulse finds, 
and one including all others, is in the doctrine of the Illusion¬ 
ists. 44 There is a painful rumor in circulation that we have 
been practised upon in all the principal performances of life, 
and free agency is the emptiest name. We have been sopped 
and drugged with the air, with food, with woman, with 
children, with sciences, with events, which leave us exactly 
where they found us. The mathematics, ’t is complained, 
leave the mind where they find it: so do all sciences; and so 
do all events and actions. I find a man who has passed* 
through all the sciences, the churl he was; and, through all 
the offices, learned, civil, and social, can detect the child. 
We are not the less necessitated to dedicate life to them. In 
fact we may come to accept it as the fixed rule and theory of 
our state of education, that God is a substance, and his 


Ii8 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


method is illusion. The eastern sages owned the goddess 
Yoganidra, 45 the great illusory energy of Vishnu, 46 by whom, 
as utter ignorance, the whole world is beguiled. 

Or shall I state it thus? — The astonishment of life is 
the absence of any appearance of reconciliation between the 
theory and practice of life. Reason, the prized reality, the 
Law, is apprehended, now and then, for a serene and profound 
moment amidst the hubbub of cares and works which have no 
direct bearing on it; — is then lost for months ‘or years, and 
again found for an interval, to be lost again. If we compute 
it in time, we may, in fifty years, have half a dozen reasonable 
hours. But what are these cares and works the better? A 
method in the world we do not see, but this parallelism of 
great and little, which never react on each other, nor discover 
the smallest tendency to converge. Experiences, fortunes, 
governings, readings, writings, are nothing to the purpose; 
as when a man comes into the room it does not appear whether 
he has been fed on yams or buffalo, — he has contrived to get 
so much bone and fibre as he wants, out of rice or out of snow. 
So vast is the disproportion between the sky of law and the 
pismire of performance under it, that whether he is a man of 
worth or a sot is not so great a matter as we say. Shall I add, 
as one juggle of this enchantment, the stunning non-inter¬ 
course law which makes co-operation impossible? The young 
spirit pants to enter society. But all the ways of culture and 
greatness lead to solitary imprisonment. He has been often 
baulked. He did not expect a sympathy with his thought 
from the village, but he went with it to the chosen and intelli¬ 
gent, and found no entertainment for it, but mere misappre¬ 
hension, distaste, and scoffing. Men are strangely mistimed 
and misapplied; and the excellence of each is an inflamed 
individualism which separates him more. 

There are these, and more than these diseases of thought, 
which our ordinary teachers do not attempt to remove. Now 
shall we, because a good nature inclines us to virtue’s side, 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 


119 

say, “There are no doubts,” —and lie for the right? Is life 
to be led in a brave or in a cowardly manner? and is not the 
satisfaction of the doubts essential to all manliness? Is the 
name of virtue to be a barrier to that which is virtue? Can 
you not believe that a man of earnest and burly habit may 
find small good in tea, essays, and catechism, and want a 
rougher instruction, want men, labor, trade, farming, war, 
hunger, plenty, love, hatred, doubt, and terror to make 
things plain to him; and has he not a right to insist on being 
convinced in his own way? When he is convinced, he will be 
worth the pains. 

Belief consists in accepting the affirmations of the soul; 
unbelief, in denying them. Some minds are incapable of 
skepticism. The doubts they profess to entertain are rather 
a civility or accommodation to the common discourse of their 
company. They may well give themselves leave to speculate, 
for they are secure of a return. Once admitted to the heaven 
of thought, they see no relapse into night, but infinite invi¬ 
tation on the other side. Heaven is within heaven, and sky 
over sky, and they are encompassed with divinities. Others 
there are to whom the heaven is brass, and it shuts down to 
the surface of the earth. It is a question of temperament, or 
of more or less immersion in nature. The last class must needs 
have a reflex or parasite faith; not a sight of realities, but an 
instinctive reliance on the seers and believers of realities. 
The manners and thoughts of believers astonish them and 
convince them that these have seen something which is hid 
from themselves. But their sensual habit would fix the be¬ 
liever to his last position, whilst he as inevitably advances; 
and presently the unbeliever, for love of belief, burns the 
believer. 

Great believers are always reckoned infidels, impracticable, 
fantastic, atheistic, and really men of no account. The 
spiritualist finds himself driven to express his faith by a series 
of skepticisms. Charitable souls come with their projects 


120 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


and ask his co-operation. How can he hesitate? It is the 
rule of mere comity and courtesy to agree where you can, and 
to turn your sentence with something auspicious, and not 
freezing and sinister. But he is forced to say, “ O, these things 
will be as they must be: what can you do? These particular 
griefs and crimes are the foliage and fruit of such trees as we 
see growing. It is vain to complain of the leaf or the berry; 
cut it off, it will bear another just as bad. You must begin 
your cure lower down.” The generosities of the day prove 
an intractable element for him. The people’s questions are 
not his; their methods are not his; and against all the dic¬ 
tates of good nature he is driven to say he has no pleasure in 
them. 

Even the doctrines dear to the hope of man, of the divine 
Providence and of the immortality of the soul, his neighbors 
can not put the statement so that he shall affirm it. But 
he denies out of more faith, and not less. He denies out of 
honesty. He had rather stand charged with the imbecility of 
skepticism, than with untruth. “I believe,” he says, “in 
the moral design of the universe; it exists hospitably for the 
weal of souls; but your dogmas seem to me caricatures: why 
should I make believe them?” Will any say, “This is cold 
and infidel?” The wise and magnanimous will not say so. 
They will exult in his far-sighted good-will that can abandon 
to the adversary all the ground of tradition and common be¬ 
lief, without losing a jot of strength. It sees to the end of all 
transgression. George Fox 47 saw that there was “an ocean 
of darkness and death; but withal an infinite ocean of light 
and love which flowed over that of darkness.” 

The final solution in which skepticism is lost, is in the moral 
sentiment, which never forfeits its supremacy. All moods 
may be safely tried, and their weight allowed to all objections: 
the moral sentiment as easily outweighs them all, as any one. 
This is the drop which balances the sea. I play with the mis¬ 
cellany of facts, and take those superficial views which we call 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 121 

skepticism; but I know that they will presently appear to me 
in that order which makes skepticism impossible. A man 
of thought must feel the thought that is -parent of the uni¬ 
verse ; that the masses of nature do undulate and flow. 

This faith avails to the whole emergency of life and objects. 
The world is saturated with deity and with law. He is con¬ 
tent with just and unjust, with sots and fools, with the 
triumph of folly and fraud. He can behold with serenity the 
yawning gulf between the ambition of man and his power of 
performance, between the demand and supply of power, which 
makes the tragedy of all souls. 

Charles Fourier 48 announced that “the attractions of man 
are proportioned to his destinies”; in other words, that every 
desire predicts its own satisfaction. Yet all experience exhibits 
the reverse of this; the incompetency of power is the universal 
grief of young and ardent minds. They accuse the divine 
providence of a certain parsimony. It has shown the heaven 
and earth to every child and filled him with a desire for the 
whole; a desire raging, infinite; a hunger, as of space to be 
filled with planets; a cry of famine, as of devils for souls. 
Then for the satisfaction, — to each man is administered a 
single drop, a bead of dew of vital power, per day , — a cup as 
large as space, and one drop of the water of life in it. Each 
man woke in the morning with an appetite that could eat the 
solar system like a cake; a spirit for action and passion with¬ 
out bounds; he could lay his hand on the morning star; he 
could try conclusions with gravitation or chemistry; but, on 
the first motion to prove his strength, — hands, feet, senses, 
gave way and would not serve him. He was an emperor 
deserted by his states, and left to whistle by himself, or 
thrust into a mob of emperors, all whistling: and still the 
sirens 49 sang, “The attractions are proportioned to the 
destinies.” In every house, in the heart of each maiden and of 
each boy, in the soul of the soaring saint, this chasm is found, 
— between the largest promise of ideal power, and the shabby 
experience. 


122 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


The expansive nature of truth comes to our succor, elastic, 
not to be surrounded. Man helps himself by larger gen¬ 
eralizations. The lesson of life is practically to generalize; 
to believe what the years and the centuries say, against the 
hours; to resist the usurpation of particulars; to penetrate to 
their catholic sense. Things seem to say one thing, and say 
the reverse. The appearance is immoral; the result is moral. 
Things seem to tend downward, to justify despondency, to 
promote rogues, to defeat the just; and by knaves as by 
martyrs the just cause is carried forward. Although knaves 
win in every political struggle, although society seems to be 
delivered over from the hands of one set of criminals into the 
hands of another set of criminals, as fast as the government is 
changed, and the march of civilization is a train of felonies, 
— yet, general ends are somehow answered. We see, now, 
events forced on which seem to retard or retrograde the 
civility of ages. But the world-spirit is a good swimmer, and 
storms and waves cannot drown him. He snaps his finger at 
laws: and so, throughout history, heaven seems to affect low 
and poor means. Through the years and the centuries, 
through evil agents, through toys and atoms, a great and 
beneficent tendency irresistibly streams. 

Let a man learn to look for the permanent in the mutable 
and fleeting; let him learn to bear the disappearance of things 
he was wont to reverence without losing his reverence; let him 
learn that he is here, not to work but to be worked upon; 
and that, though abyss open under abyss, and opinion dis¬ 
place opinion, all are at last contained in the Eternal Cause: — 

“ If my bark sink, 't is to another sea .” 60 

^ NOTES 

1 French essayist and Jnoralist. He was born in the Chateau 
Montaigne, near Dordogne in Perigord. His parents were people 
of means, and he was reared gently with many advantages of 
learning and culture. He attended the College de Guyenne, then 
the best school in France, and studied law in Bordeaux and Tou- 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 123 

louse. His later life was spent largely on his estate. His chief 
work was the Essays. 

2 This word has fallen into disrepute since Emerson’s day as 
applied to infidels and unbelievers in Christianity. Here it 
means merely one who investigates every problem for himself, the 
opposite of the dogmatic, unthinking person. 

3 Egyptian philosopher of the so-called Neoplatonic school 
(1 ca . 205-270? A.D.). 

4 Fenelon, Francois de Salignac de la Mothe, French prelate 
and author (1651-1715). 

6 Greek lyric poet, originator of the formal ode (522-c. 448 B.c.). 

6 Byron , George Gordon, English romantic poet (1788-1824). 

7 Pope , Alexander, English classical poet (1688-1744). 

8 Swift. See page 98, note 62. 

9 Goethe. See page 23, note 48. 

10 Schiller , Johann Christoph Friedrich von, German romantic 
poet and dramatist (1759-1805). 

11 In the middle of the nineteenth century this statement was 
undoubtedly true. Now, of course, the United States has that 
honor. 

12 Spence , Joseph, English divine and critic. His Essay on 
Pope's Translation of the Odyssey and his Anecdotes , Observations , 
and Characters of Books and Men connect his name with Pope’s 
(1699-1768). 

13 English portrait painter of German birth (1646-1723). 

14 He who loves not wine, women, and song, 

* Remains a fool his whole life long. 

Attributed to Luther by Uhland in Die Geisterkelter. 

16 Cabanis , Pierre Jean George, French physician, philosopher, 
and statesman (1757-1808). 

16 Lord Bolingbroke, Henry Saint John, Viscount, English 
statesman, essayist, and political writer (1678-1751). 

17 An inhabitant of Gibeon, a Biblical town in the time of 
Joshua. One who pretends. See Joshua, IX. 

18 Greek verb meaning to look at, behold, contemplate. Hence, 
consider. 

19 See page 59, note 63. 

20 See page 22, note 34. 

21 The natives of Sparta in Greece were noted for their ex¬ 
ceptionally austere way of life and rigorously severe discipline. 
The Stoics, members of one of the chief schools of Greek philos¬ 
ophy founded by Zeno, 308 B.C., believed that the highest good 
was virtue, to attain which all lesser goods should be sacrificed. 

22 Emerson may have been thinking of the Quakers here, for he 
has much to say about them from time to time and expresses 
sympathy for their spiritual views. He does not entirely accept 
their attitude toward war, however. 

23 Charles Cotton was poet, translator of Montaigne’s Essays. 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


124 

This translation was an acknowledged masterpiece, frequently re¬ 
printed (1630-1687). 

24 A cemetery of Paris, the largest in the world. 

26 British poet and essayist (1806-1844). 

26 Perigord was a former division of Guienne province ir. 
central France. 

27 Mr. Hazlitt (William Hazlitt), English journalist, essayist, 
and critic (1778-1830). 

28 John Florio’s translation of Montaigne is still considered the 
standard (ca. 1553-1625). 

29 English dramatist, friend and contemporary of Shakspeare 

(I 573 -I 637 )- . , 

30 English poet, critic and essayist (1784-1859). 

31 A native or inhabitant of Gascony, a former province of 
south-western France. 

32 During the sixteenth century there was going on in France a 
struggle for supremacy between Catholics and Protestants. 
The Catholics formed a famous Catholic League, or Holy Union, 
a confederacy to defend the faith against heresy and uphold the 
king. 

33 Gibbon , Edward, English historian (1737-1794). 

34 The Great; first of the Bourbon kings of France (1553-1610) 

36 Scholars perhaps. 

36 French for “What do I know?” 

37 Maria Edgeworth wrote a book called Parents' Assistant or> 
Stories for Children. Old Poz, a study of a country magistrate in 
dramatic form, was one of the sketches included. The name sug¬ 
gested the very positive nature of the hero’s attitude of mind. 

38 The reference here is probably to a poem of Raleigh’s 
called The Lie , which begins “Go soul, the body’s guest,” etc. 
(1552-1618). 

39 See page 58, note 61. 

40 One of Emerson’s friends was a very sentimental mystic by 
the name of Charles Newcomb (1820-1894), who loved the 
Roman Catholic symbolism, but joined the Transcendental 
group because of its nonsectarian interest in mysticism. Emer¬ 
son calls him San Carlo, (or St. Charles), because of his abnormal 
sensitiveness. 

41 One of the seven chief devils in the old demonology, the 
second of the .fallen archangels, and the most powerful spirit in 
hell after Satan. 

42 A species of sprite or goblin, an object of superstitious fear; 
hence, any imaginary cause of terror or dread. 

43 A city in Switzerland which was the stronghold of Calvinism. 

44 A believer in illusionism, a doctrine of the material world 
that treats it as an illusion of the senses. 

46 One of the names of one of the most important goddesses in 
the religion of India. 


MONTAIGNE; OR, THE SKEPTIC 125 

46 The second god of the Hindoo trinity. 

47 The founder of the Society of Friends (1624-1691). 

48 Charles Fourier (Frangois Charles Marie Fourier), French 
socialist (1772-1837). 

49 A group of sea nymphs located on an island in the Mediter¬ 
ranean Sea, the same which Ulysses escaped by having himself tied 
to the mast and his sailors’ ears stopped with wax. 

60 From a poem by William Ellery Channing entitled A Poet's 
Hope. 


V 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

REAT men are more distinguished by range and extent 
than by originality. If we require the originality which 
consists in weaving, like a spider, their web from their own 
bowels; in finding clay and making bricks and building the 
house; no great men are original. Nor does valuable origi¬ 
nality consist in unlikeness to other men. The hero is in the 
press of knights and the thick of events; and seeing what men 
want and sharing their desire, he adds the needful length of 
sight and of arm, to come at the desired point. The greatest 
genius is the most indebted man. A poet is no rattle-brain, 
saying what comes uppermost, and, because he says every 
thing, saying at last something good; but a heart in unison 
with his time and country. There is nothing whimsical and 
fantastic in his production, but sweet and sad earnest, 
freighted with the weightiest convictions and pointed with 
the most determined aim which any man or class knows of in 
his times. 

The Genius of our life is jealous of individuals, and will 
not have any individual great, except through the general. 
There is no choice to genius. A great man does not wake up 
on some fine morning and say, “I am full of life, I will go to 
sea and find an Antarctic continent: to-day I will square the 
circle: I will ransack botany and find a new food for man: I 
have a new architecture in my mind: I foresee a new me¬ 
chanic power”: no, but he finds himself in the river of the 
thoughts and events, forced onward by the idea and necessi¬ 
ties of his contemporaries. He stands where all the eyes of 
men look one way, and their hands all point in the direction 

126 




127 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

in which he should go. The Church has reared him amidst 
rites and pomps, and he carries out the advice which her 
music gave him, and builds a cathedral needed by her chants 
and processions. He finds a war raging: it educates him, by 
trumpet, in barracks, and he betters the instruction. He 
finds two counties groping to bring coal, or flour, or fish, from 
the place of production to the place of consumption, and he 
hits on a railroad. Every master has found his materials 
collected, and his power lay in his sympathy with his people 
and in his love of the materials he wrought in. What an 
economy of power! and what a compensation for the shortness 
of life! All is done to his hand. The world has brought him 
thus far on his way. The human race has gone out before 
him, sunk the hills, filled the hollows, and bridged the rivers. 
Men, nations, poets, artisans, women, all have worked for 
him, and he enters into their labors. Choose any other thing, 
out of the line of tendency, out of the national feeling and 
history, and he would have all to do for himself: his powers 
would be expended in the first preparations. Great genial 
power, one would almost say, consists in not being original at 
all; in being altogether receptive; in letting the world do all, 
and suffering the spirit of the hour to pass unobstructed 
through the mind. 

Shakspeare’s youth fell in a time when the English people 
were importunate for dramatic entertainments. The court 
took offence easily at political allusions and attempted to 
suppress them. The Puritans, a growing and energetic party, 
and the religious among the Anglican church, would suppress 
them. But the people wanted them. Inn-yards, houses 
without roofs, and extemporaneous enclosures at country 
fairs were the ready theatres of strolling players. The people 
had tasted this new joy; and, as we could not hope to suppress 
newspapers now, — no, not by the strongest party, — neither 
then could king, prelate, or puritan, alone or united, suppress 
an organ which was ballad, epic, newspaper, caucus, lecture, 


128 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


Punch, 1 and library, at the same time. Probably king, prelate, 
and puritan, all found their own account in it. It had become, 
by all causes, a national interest, — by no means conspicuous, 
so that some great scholar would have thought of treating it 
in an English history, — but not a whit less considerable 
because it was cheap and of no account, like a baker’s-shop. 
The best proof of its vitality is the crowd of writers which 
suddenly broke into this field; Kyd, Marlow, Greene, Jonson, 
Chapman, Dekker, Webster, Heywood, Middleton, Peele, 
Ford, Massinger, Beaumont and Fletcher. 2 

The secure possession, by the stage, of the public mind, is 
of the first importance to the poet who works for it. He loses 
no. time in idle experiments. Here is an audience and ex¬ 
pectation prepared. In the case of Shakspeare there is much 
more. At the time when he left Stratford and went up to 
London, a great body of stage-plays of all dates and writers 
existed in manuscript and were in turn produced on the 
boards. Here is the Tale of Troy, which the audience will 
bear hearing some part of, every week; the Death of Julius 
Caesar, and other stories out of Plutarch, which they never 
tire of; a shelf full of English history, from the chronicles 
of Brut and Arthur, 3 down to the royal Henries, which men 
hear eagerly; and a string of doleful tragedies, merry Italian 
tales and Spanish voyages, which all the London ’prentices 
know. All the mass has been treated, with more or less skill, 
by every playwright, and the prompter has the soiled and 
tattered manuscripts. It is now no longer possible to say who 
wrote them first. They have been the property of the Theatre 
so long, and so many rising geniuses have enlarged or altered 
them, inserting a speech or a whole scene, or adding a song, 
that no man can any longer claim copyright in this work of 
numbers. Happily, no man wishes to. They are not yet 
desired in that way. We have few readers, many spectators 
and hearers. They had best lie where they are. 

Shakspeare, in common with his comrades, esteemed the 


129 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

mass of old plays waste stock, in which any experiment could [ 
be freely tried. Had the prestige which hedges about a modern 
tragedy existed, nothing could have been done. The rude 
warm blood of the living England circulated in the play, as in 
street-ballads, and gave body which he wanted to his airy and 
majestic fancy. The poet needs a ground in popular tradition 
on which he may work, and which, again, may restrain his 
art within the due temperance. It holds him to the people, 
supplies a foundation for his edifice, and in furnishing so much 
work done to his hand, leaves him at leisure and in full 
strength for the audacities of his imagination. In short, the 
poet owes to his legend what sculpture owed to the temple. 
Sculpture in Egypt and in' Greece grew up in subordination 
to architecture. It was the ornament of the temple wall: 
at first a rude relief carved on pediments, then the relief 
became bolder and a head or arm was projected from the wall; 
the groups being still arranged with reference to the building, 
which serves also as a frame to hold the figures; and when at 
last the greatest freedom of style and treatment was reached, 
the prevailing genius of architecture still enforced a certain 
calmness and continence in the statue. As soon as the statue 
was begun for itself, and with no reference to the temple or 
palace, the art began to decline: freak, extravagance, and 
exhibition took the place of the old temperance. This bal¬ 
ance-wheel, which the sculptor found in architecture, the 
perilous irritability of poetic talent found in the accumulated 
dramatic materials to which the people were already wonted, 
and which had a certain excellence which no single genius, 
however extraordinary, could hope to create. 

In point of fact it appears that Shakspeare did owe debts 
in all directions, and was able to use whatever he found; and 
the amount of indebtedness may be inferred from Malone’s 
laborious computations 4 in regard to the First, Second, and 
Third parts of Henry VI., in which, “out of 6,043 lines, 1,771 
were written by some author preceding Shakspeare, 2,373 


130 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


by him, on the foundation laid by his predecessors, and 1,899 
were entirely his own.” And the proceeding investigation 
hardly leaves a single drama of his absolute invention. Ma¬ 
lone’s sentence is an important piece of external history. In 
Henry VIII. I think I see plainly the cropping out of the 
original rock on which his own finer stratum was laid. The 
first play was written by a superior, thoughtful man, with a 
vicious ear. I can mark his lines, and know well their cadence. 
See Wolsey’s soliloquy, 6 and the following scene with Crom¬ 
well, where instead of the metre of Shakspeare, whose secret is 
that the thought constructs the tune, so that reading for the 
sense will best bring out the rhythm, — here the lines are 
constructed on a given tune, and the verse has even a trace of 
pulpit eloquence. But the play contains through all its length 
unmistakable traits of Shakspeare’s hand, and some passages, 
as the account of the coronation, are like autographs. What 
is odd, the compliment to Queen Elizabeth 6 is in the bad 
rhythm. 

; , Shakspeare knew that tradition supplies a better fable 
than any invention can. If he lost any credit of design, he 
augmented his resources; and, at that day, our petulant de¬ 
mand for originality was not so much pressed. There was no 
literature for the million. The universal reading, the cheap 
press, were unknown. A great poet who appears in illiterate 
times, absorbs into his sphere all the light which is any where 
radiating. Every intellectual jewel, every flower of sentiment 
it is his fine office to bring to his people; and he comes to 
value his memory equally with his invention. He is therefore 
little solicitous whence his thoughts have * been derived; 
whether through translation, whether through tradition, 
whether by travel in distant countries, whether by inspira¬ 
tion; from whatever source, they are equally welcome to his 
uncritical audience. Nay, he borrows very near home. Other 
men say wise things as well as he; only they say a good many 
foolish things, and do not know when they have spoken wisely. 


131 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

He knows the sparkle of the true stone, and puts it in high 
place, wherever he finds it. Such is the happy position of 
Homer perhaps; of Chaucer, 7 of Saadi. They felt that all wit 
was their wit. And they are librarians and historiographers, 
as well as poets. Each romancer was heir and dispenser of all 
the hundred tales of the world, — 

“Presenting Thebes’ and Pelops’ line 8 
And the tale of Troy divine.” 

The influence of Chaucer is conspicuous in all our early litera¬ 
ture ; and more recently not only Pope 9 and Dryden 10 have 
been beholden to him, but, in the whole society of English 
writers, a large unacknowledged debt is easily traced. One is 
charmed with the opulence which needs so many pensioners. 
But Chaucer is a huge borrower. Chaucer, it seems, drew con¬ 
tinually, through Lydgate and Caxton, 11 from Guido di 
Colonna, whose Latin romance of the Trojan war was in turn 
a compilation from Dares Phrygius, 12 Ovid, 13 and Statius. 14 
Then Petrarch, 15 Boccaccio, 16 and the Provencal poets 17 are his 
benefactors: the Romaunt of the Rose 18 is only judicious 
translation from William of Lorris and John of Meung: 
Troilus and Creseide, from Lollius of Urbino: 19 The Cock and 
the Fox, 20 from the Lais of Marie: 21 The House of Fame, 22 
from the French or Italian: and poor Gower 23 he uses as if 
he were only a brick-kiln or stone-quarry out of which to build 
his house. He steals by this apology, — that what he takes 
has no worth where he finds it and the greatest where he leaves 
it. It has come to be practically a sort of rule in literature, 
that a man having once shown himself capable of original 
writing, is entitled thenceforth to steal from the writings of 
others at discretion. Thought is the property of him who can 
entertain it and of him who can adequately place it. A certain 
awkwardness marks the use of borrowed thoughts; but as 
soon as we have learned what to do with them they become 


our own. 


132 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


Thus all originality is relative. Every thinker is retro¬ 
spective. The learned member of the legislature, at West¬ 
minster 24 or at Washington, speaks and votes for thousands. 
Show us the constituency, and the now invisible channels by 
which the senator is made aware of their wishes; the crowd 
of practical and knowing men, who, by correspondence or 
conversation, are feeding him with evidence, anecdotes, and 
estimates, and it will bereave his fine attitude and resistance 
of something of their impressiveness. As Sir Robert Peel 25 
and Mr. Webster vote, so Locke and Rousseau 26 think, for 
thousands; and so there were fountains all around Homer, 
Menu, Saadi, or Milton, 27 from which they drew; friends, 
lovers, books, traditions, proverbs, — all perished — which, 
if seen, would go to reduce the wonder. Did the bard speak 
with authority? Did he feel himself overmatched by any 
companion? The appeal is to the consciousness of the writer. 
Is there at last in his breast a Delphi 28 whereof to ask con¬ 
cerning any thought or thing, whether it be verily so, yea or 
nay? and to have answer, and to rely on that? All the debts 
which such a man could contract to other wit would never dis¬ 
turb his consciousness of originality; for the ministrations of 
books and of other minds are a whiff of smoke to that most 
private reality with which he has conversed. 

It is easy to see that what is best written or done by genius 
in the world, was no man’s work, but came by wide social 
labor, when a thousand wrought like one, sharing the same 
impulse. Our English Bible is a wonderful specimen of the 
strength and music of the English language. But it was not 
made by one man, or at one time; but centuries and churches 
brought it to perfection. There never was a time when there 
was not some translation existing. The Liturgy, admired for 
its energy and pathos, is an anthology of the piety of ages and 
nations, a translation of the prayers and forms of the Catholic 
church, — these collected, too, in long periods, from the 
prayers and meditations of every saint and sacred writer all 


133 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

over the world. Grotius 29 makes the like remark in respect to 
the Lord’s prayer, that the single clauses of which it is com¬ 
posed were already in use in the time of Christ, in the Rabbin¬ 
ical forms. He picked out the grains of gold. The nervous 
language of the Common Law, the impressive forms of our 
courts, and the precision and substantial truth of the legal 
distinctions, are the contribution of all the sharp-sighted, 
strong-minded men who have lived in the countries where 
these laws govern. The translation of Plutarch 30 gets its 
excellence by being translation on translation. There never 
was a time when there was none. All the truly idiomatic and 
national phrases are kept, and all others successively picked 
out and thrown away. Something like the same process had 
gone on, long before, with the originals of these books. The 
world takes liberties with world-books. Vedas, 31 HLsop’s 
Fables, Pilpay, 32 Arabian Nights, Cid, 33 Iliad, 34 Robin Hood, 35 
Scottish Minstrelsy, 36 are not the work of single men. In the 
composition of such works the time thinks, the market thinks, 
the mason, the carpenter, the merchant, the farmer, the fop, 
all think for us. Every book supplies its time with one good 
word; every municipal law, every trade, every folly of the 
day; and the generic catholic genius who is not afraid or 
ashamed to owe his originality to the originality of all, stands 
with the next age as the recorder and embodiment of his own. 

We have to thank the researches of antiquaries, and the 
Shakspeare Society, 37 for ascertaining the steps of the English 
drama, from the Mysteries 38 celebrated in churches and by 
churchmen, and the final detachment from the church, and 
the completion of secular plays, from Ferrex and Porrex, 39 
and Gammer Gurton’s Needle, 40 down to the possession of the 
stage by the very pieces which Shakspeare altered, remodelled, 
and finally made his own. Elated with success and piqued 
by the growing interest of the problem, they have left no 
book-stall unsearched, no chest in a garret unopened, no file 
of yellow accounts to decompose in damp and worms, so keen 


134 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


was the hope to discover whether the boy Shakspeare 
poached 41 or not, whether he held horses at the theatre door, 
whether he kept school, and why he left in his will only his 
second-best bed to Ann Hathaway, his wife. 

There is somewhat touching in the madness with which the 
passing age mischooses the object on which all candles shine 
and all eyes are turned; the care with which it registers every 
trifle touching Queen Elizabeth and King James, and the 
Essexes, Leicesters, Burleighs, and Buckinghams; 42 and lets 
pass without a single valuable note the founder of another 
dynasty, which alone will cause the Tudor dynasty 43 to be 
remembered, — the man who carries the Saxon race in him 
by the inspiration which feeds him, and on whose thoughts 
the foremost people of the world are now for some ages to be 
nourished, and minds to receive this and not another bias. 
A popular player; — nobody suspected, he was the poet of the 
human race; and the secret was kept as faithfully from poets 
and intellectual men as from courtiers and frivolous people. 
Bacon, who took the inventory of the human understanding 
for his times, never mentioned his name. Ben Jonson, 44 
though we have strained his few words of regard and pane¬ 
gyric, had no suspicion of the elastic fame whose first vibra¬ 
tions he was attempting. He no doubt thought the praise 
he has conceded to him generous, and esteemed himself, out 
of all question, the better poet of the two. 

If it need wit to know wit, according to the proverb, Shak- 
speare’s time should be capable of recognizing it. Sir Henry 
Wotton 46 was born four years after Shakspeare, and died 
twenty-three years after him; and I find, among his corre¬ 
spondents and acquaintances, the following persons: Theodore 
Beza, 46 Isaac Casaubon, 47 Sir Philip Sidney, 48 the Earl of 
Essex, 49 Lord Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, John Milton, Sir 
Henry Vane, 60 Isaac Walton, 51 Dr. Donne, 52 Abraham Cow¬ 
ley, 63 Bellarmine, 64 Charles Cotton, 56 John Pym, 56 John Hales, 57 
Kepler, 58 Vieta, 69 Albericus Gentilis, 60 Paul Sarpi, 61 Armin- 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 


135 


ius; 62 with all of whom exists some token of his having com¬ 
municated, without enumerating many others whom doubtless 
he saw,—Shakspeare, Spenser, 63 Jonson, Beaumont, 64 Mas¬ 
singer, 65 the two Herberts, 66 Marlow, 67 Chapman, 68 and the 
rest. Since the constellation of great men who appeared in 
Greece in the time of Pericles, there was never any such so¬ 
ciety ; — yet their genius failed them to find out the best head 
in the universe. Our poet’s mask was impenetrable. You 
cannot see the mountain near. It took a century to make it 
suspected; and not until two centuries had passed, after his 
death, did any criticism which we think adequate begin to ap¬ 
pear. It was not possible to write the history of Shakspeare 
till now; for he is the father of German literature: it was with 
the introduction of Shakspeare into German, by Lessing, 69 and 
the translation of his works by Wieland 70 and Schlegel, 71 that 
the rapid burst of German literature was most intimately 
connected. It was not until the nineteenth century, whose 
speculative genius is a sort of living Hamlet, that the tragedy 
of Hamlet could find such wondering readers. Now, litera¬ 
ture, philosophy, and thought, are Shakspearized. His mind 
is the horizon beyond which, at present, we do not see. Our 
ears are educated to music by his rhythm. Coleridge 72 and 
Goethe are the only critics who have expressed our convictions 
with any adequate fidelity: but there is in all cultivated minds 
a silent appreciation of his superlative power and beauty, 
which, like Christianity, qualifies the period. 

The Shakspeare Society have inquired in all directions, ad¬ 
vertised the missing facts, offered money for any information 
that will lead to proof, — and with what result? Beside 
some important illustration of the history of the English 
stage, to which I have adverted, they have gleaned a few facts 
touching the property, and dealings in regard to property, of 
the poet. It appears that from year to year he owned a 
larger share in the Blackfriars’ Theatre: 73 its wardrobe and 
other appurtenances were his: that he bought an estate in his 


136 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


native village with his earnings as writer and shareholder; that 
he lived in the best house in Stratford; was intrusted by his 
neighbors with their commissions in London, as of borrowing 
money, and the like; that he was a veritable farmer. About 
the time when he was writing Macbeth, he sues Philip 
Rogers, 74 in the borough-court of Stratford, for thirty-five 
shillings, ten pence, for corn delivered to him at different 
times; and in all respects appears as a good husband, with 
no reputation for eccentricity or excess. He was a good- 
natured sort of man, an actor, and shareholder in the theatre, 
not in any striking manner distinguished from other actors 
and managers. I admit the importance of this information. 
It was well worth the pains that have been taken to procure it. 

But whatever scraps of information concerning his con¬ 
dition these researches may have rescued, they can shed no 
light upon that infinite invention which is the concealed 
magnet of his attraction for us. We are very clumsy writers 
of history. We tell the chronicle of parentage, birth, birth¬ 
place, schooling, school-mates, earning of money, marriage, 
publication of books, celebrity, death; and when we have 
come to an end of this gossip, no ray of relation appears be¬ 
tween it and the goddess-born; and it seems as if, had we 
dipped at random into the “Modern Plutarch,” 75 and read 
any other life there, it would have fitted the poems as well. 
It is the essence of poetry to spring, like the rainbow daughter 
of Wonder, from the invisible, to abolish the past and refuse 
all history. Malone, 76 Warburton, Dyce, and Collier, have 
wasted their oil. The famed theatres, Covent Garden, 77 
Drury Lane, the Park, and Tremont 78 have vainly assisted. 
Betterton, Garrick, Kemble, Kean, and Macready 79 dedicate 
their lives to this genius; him they crown, elucidate, obey, 
and express. The genius knows them not. The recitation 
begins; one golden word leaps out immortal from all this 
painted pedantry and sweetly torments us with invitations to 
its own inaccessible homes. I remember I went once to see the 


137 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

Hamlet of a famed performer, the pride of the English stage; 
and all I then heard and all I now remember of the tragedian 
was that in which the tragedian had no part; simply Hamlet’s 
question to the ghost: — 

“What may this mean, 80 
That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel 
Revisit’st thus the glimpses of the moon? ” 

That imagination which dilates the closet he writes in to the 
world’s dimension, crowds it with agents in rank and order, as 
quickly reduces the big reality to be the glimpses of the moon. 
These tricks of his magic spoil for us the illusions of the green¬ 
room. Can any biography shed light on the localities into 
which the Midsummer Night’s Dream admits me? Did 
Shakspeare confide to any notary or parish recorder, sacris¬ 
tan, or surrogate in Stratford, the genesis of that delicate 
creation? The forest of Arden, 81 the nimble air of Scone 
Castle, the moonlight of Portia’s villa, “the antres vast and 
desarts idle” of Othello’s captivity,—where is the third 
cousin, or grand-nephew, the chancellor’s file of accounts, or 
private letter, that has kept one word of those transcendent 
secrets? In fine, in this drama, as in all great works of art, 
— in the Cyclopaean architecture of Egypt and India, 82 in 
the Phidian sculpture, 83 the Gothic minsters, 84 the Italian 
painting, the Ballads of Spain and Scotland, — the Genius 
draws up the ladder after him, when the creative age goes up 
to heaven, and gives way to a new age, which sees the works 
and asks in vain for a history. 

Shakspeare is the only biographer of Shakspeare; and 
even he can tell nothing, except to the Shakspeare in us, that 
is, to our most apprehensive and sympathetic hour. He 
cannot step from off his tripod and give us anecdotes of his 
inspirations. Read the antique documents extricated, an¬ 
alyzed, and compared by the assiduous Dyce and Collier, and 
now read one of these skyey sentences, — aerolites, — which 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


i3« 

seem to have fallen out of heaven, and which not your ex¬ 
perience but the man within the breast has accepted as words 
of fate, and tell me if they match; if the former account in 
any manner for the latter; or which gives the most historical 
insight into the man. 

Hence, though our external history is so meagre, yet, with 
Shakspeare for biographer, instead of Aubrey and Rowe, 85 
we have really the information which is material; that which 
describes character and fortune, that which, if we were about 
to meet the man and deal with him, would most import us to 
know. We have his recorded convictions on those questions 
which knock for answer at every heart, — on life and death, 
on love, on wealth and poverty, on the prizes of life and the 
ways whereby we come at them; on the characters of men, 
and the influences, occult and open, which affect their for¬ 
tunes ; and on those mysterious and demoniacal powers which 
defy our science and which yet interweave their malice and 
their gift in our brightest hours. Who ever read the volume 
of the Sonnets without finding that the poet had there re¬ 
vealed, under the masks that are no masks to the intelligent, 
the lore of friendship and of love; the confusion of sentiments 
in the most susceptible, and, at the same time, the most 
intellectual of men? What trait of his private mind has he 
hidden in his dramas? One can discern, in his ample picture 
of the gentleman and the king, what forms and humanities 
pleased him; his delight in troops of friends, in large hospi¬ 
tality, in cheerful giving. Let Timon, 86 let Warwick, let 
Antonio the merchant answer for his great heart. So far from 
Shakspeare’s being the least known, he is the one person, in all 
modern history, known to us. What point of morals, of 
manners, of economy, of philosophy, of religion, of taste, of 
the conduct of life, has he not settled? What mystery has he 
not signified his knowledge of? What office, or function, or 
district of man’s work, has he not remembered? What king 
has He not taught state, as Talma taught Napoleon? 87 What 


139 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 

maiden has not found him finer than her delicacy? What lover 
has he not outloved? What sage has he not outseen? What 
gentleman has he not instructed in the rudeness of his be¬ 
havior? 

Some able and appreciating critics think no criticism on 
Shakspeare valuable that does not rest purely on the dramatic 
merit; that he is falsely judged as poet and philosopher. 
I think as highly as these critics of his dramatic merit, but 
still think it secondary. He was a full man, 88 who liked to 
talk; a brain exhaling thoughts and images, which, seeking 
vent, found the drama next at hand. Had he been less, we 
should have had to consider how well he filled his place, how 
good a dramatist he was, — and he is the best in the world. 
But it turns out that what he has to say is of that weight as to 
withdraw some attention from the vehicle; and he is like 
some saint whose history is to be rendered into all languages, 
into verse and prose, into songs and pictures, and cut up into 
proverbs; so that the occasion which gave the saint’s meaning 
the form of a conversation, or of a prayer, or of a code of laws, 
is immaterial compared with the universality of its application. 
So it fares with the wise Shakspeare and his book of life. He 
wrote the airs for all our modern music: he wrote the text of 
modern life; the text of manners: he drew the man of Eng¬ 
land and Europe; the father of the man in America; he drew 
the man, and described the day, and what is done in it: he 
read the hearts of men and women, their probity, and their 
second thought and wiles; the wiles of innocence, and the 
transitions by which virtues and vices slide into their con¬ 
traries: he could divide the mother’s part from the father’s 
part in the face of the child, or draw the fine demarcation of 
freedom and of fate: he knew the laws of repression which 
make the police of nature: and all the sweets and all the 
terrors of human lot lay in his mind as truly but as softly as 
the landscape lies on the eye. And the importance of this 
wisdom of life sinks the form, as of Drama or Epic, out of 


140 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


notice. ’T is like making a question concerning the paper 
on which a king’s message is written. 

Shakspeare is as much out of the category of eminent 
authors, as he is out of the crowd. He is inconceivably wise; 
the others, conceivably. A good reader can, in a sort, nestle 
into Plato’s brain and think, from thence; but not into Shak- 
speare’s. We are still out of doors. For executive faculty, 
for creation, Shakspeare is unique. No man can imagine it 
better. He was the farthest reach of sublety compatible with 
an individual self, — the subtilest of authors, and only just 
within the possibility of authorship. With this wisdom of 
life is the equal endowment of imaginative and of lyric power. 
He clothed the creatures of his legend with form and senti¬ 
ments as if they were people who had lived under his roof; 
and few real men have left such distinct characters as these 
fictions. And they spoke in a language as sweet as it was fit. 
Yet his talents never seduced him into an ostentation, nor 
did he harp on one string. An omnipresent humanity co¬ 
ordinates all his faculties. Give a man of talents a story to 
tell, and his partiality will presently appear. He has certain 
observations, opinions, topics which have some accidental 
prominence, and which he disposes all to exhibit. He crams 
this part and starves that other part, consulting not the fitness 
of the thing, but his fitness and strength. But Shakspeare has 
no peculiarity, no importunate topic; but all is duly given; 
no veins, no curiosities; no cow-painter, no bird-fancier, no 
mannerist is he: he has no discoverable egotism: the great he 
tells greatly; the small subordinately. He is wise without 
emphasis or assertion; he is strong, as nature is strong, who 
lifts the land into mountain slopes without effort and by the 
same rule as she floats a bubble in the air, and likes as well to 
do the one as the other. This makes that equality of power in 
farce, tragedy, narrative, and love-songs; and merit so in¬ 
cessant that each reader is incredulous of the perception of 
other readers. 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 141 

This power of expression, or of transferring the inmost 
truth of things into music and verse, makes him the type of 
the poet and has added a new problem to metaphysics. This 
is that which throws him into natural history, as a main pro¬ 
duction of the globe, and as announcing new eras and ameliora¬ 
tions. Things were mirrored in his poetry without loss or 
blur: he could paint the fine with precision, the great with 
compass, the tragic and the comic indifferently and without 
any distortion or favor. He carried his powerful execution 
into minute details, to a hair point; finishes an eyelash or a 
dimple as firmly as he draws a mountain; and yet these, like 
nature’s, will bear the scrutiny of the solar microscope. 

In short, he is the chief example to prove that more or less 
of production, more or fewer pictures, is a thing indifferent. 
He had the power to make one picture. Daguerre 89 learned 
how to let one flower etch its image on his plate of iodine, 
and then proceeds at leisure to etch a million. There are 
always objects; but there was never representation. Here 
is perfect representation, at last; and now let the world of 
figures sit for their portraits. No recipe can be given for the 
making of a Shakspeare; but the possibility of the translation 
of things into song is demonstrated. 

His lyric power lies in the genius of the piece. The sonnets, 
though their excellence is lost in the splendor of the dramas, 
are as inimitable as they; and it is not a merit of lines, but a 
total merit of the piece; like the tone of voice of some incom¬ 
parable person, so is this a speech of poetic beings, and any 
clause as unproducible now as a whole poem. 

Though the speeches in the plays, and single lines, have a 
beauty which tempts the ear to pause on them for their 
euphuism, yet the sentence is so loaded with meaning and so 
linked with its foregoers and followers, that the logician is 
satisfied. His means are as admirable as his ends; every 
subordinate invention, by which he helps himself to connect 
some irreconcilable opposites, is a poem too. He is not re- 


I 4 2 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


duced to dismount and walk because his horses are running 
off with him in some distant direction: he always rides. 

The finest poetry was first experience; but the thought has 
suffered a transformation since it was an experience. Culti¬ 
vated men often attain a good degree of skill in writing verses; 
but it is easy to read, through their poems, their personal 
history: any one acquainted with the parties can name every 
figure; this is Andrew and that is Rachel. The sense thus 
remains prosaic. It is a caterpillar with wings, and not yet a 
butterfly. In the poet’s mind the fact has gone quite over 
into the new element of thought, and has lost all that is 
exuvial. This generosity abides with Shakspeare. We say, 
from the truth and closeness of his pictures, that he knows the 
lesson by heart. Yet there is not a trace of egotism. 

One more royal trait properly belongs to the poet. I mean 
his cheerfulness, without which no man can be a poet, — for 
beauty is his aim. He loves virtue, not for its obligation but 
for its grace: he delights in the world, in man, in woman, for 
the lovely light that sparkles from them. Beauty, the spirit of 
joy and hilarity, he sheds over the universe. Epicurus 90 relates 
that poetry hath such charms that a lover might forsake his 
mistress to partake of them. And the true bards have been 
noted for their firm and cheerful temper. Homer lies in 
sunshine; Chaucer is glad and erect; and Saadi says, “It was 
rumored abroad that I was penitent; but what had I to do 
with repentance?” Not less sovereign and cheerful, —much 
more sovereign and cheerful, is the tone of Shakspeare. 
His name suggests joy and emancipation to the heart of men. 
If he should appear in any company of human souls, who 
would not march in his troop? He touches nothing that does 
not borrow health and longevity from his festal style. 

And now, how stands the account of man with this bard 
and benefactor, when, in solitude, shutting our ears to the 
reverberations of his fame, we seek to strike the balance? 
Solitude has austere lessons; it can teach us to spare both 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 143 

heroes and poets; and it weighs Shakspeare also, and finds 
him to share the halfness and imperfection of humanity. 

Shakspeare, Homer, Dante, Chaucer, saw the splendor of 
meaning that plays over the visible world; knew that a tree 
had another use than for apples, and corn another than for 
meal, and the ball of the earth, than for tillage and roads: 
that these things bore a second and finer harvest to the mind, 
being emblems of its thoughts, and conveying in all their 
natural history a certain mute commentary on human life. 
Shakspeare employed them as colors to compose his picture. 
He rested in their beauty; and never took the step which 
seemed inevitable to such genius, namely to explore the virtue 
which resides in these symbols and imparts this power: — 
what is that which they themselves say? He converted 
the elements which waited on his commands, into entertain¬ 
ments. He was master of the revels to mankind. Is it not as 
if one should have, through majestic powers of science, the 
comets given into his hand, or the planets and their moons, 
and should draw them from their orbits to glare with the 
municipal fireworks on a holiday night, and advertise in all 
towns, “Very superior pyrotechny this evening?” Are the 
agents of nature, and the power to understand them, worth 
no more than a street serenade, or the breath of a cigar? One 
remembers again the trumpet-text in the Koran, — “The 
heavens and the earth and all that is between them, think ye 
we have created them in jest?” As long as the question is of 
talent and mental power, the world of men has not his equal 
to show. But when the question is, to life and its materials 
and its auxiliaries, how does he profit me? What does it 
signify? It is but a Twelfth Night, or Midsummer Night’s 
Dream, or Winter Evening’s Tale: what signifies another 
picture more or less? The Egyptian verdict of the Shakspeare 
Societies comes to mind; that he was a jovial actor and 
manager. I can not marry this fact to his verse. Other ad¬ 
mirable men have led lives in some sort of keeping with their 


144 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


thought; but this man, in wide contrast. Had he been less, 
had he reached only the common measure of great authors, 
of Bacon, Milton, Tasso, 91 Cervantes, 92 we might leave the 
fact in the twilight of human fate: but that this man of men, 
he who gave to the science of mind a new and larger subject 
than had ever existed, and planted the standard of humanity 
some furlongs forward into Chaos, 93 — that he should not be 
wise for himself; — it must even go into the world’s history 
that the best poet led an obscure and profane life, using his 
genius for the public amusement. 

Well, other men, priest and prophet, Israelite, German, 
and Swede, beheld the same objects: they also saw through 
them that which was contained. And to what purpose? The 
beauty straightway vanished; they read commandments, all- 
excluding mountainous duty; an obligation, a sadness, as of 
piled mountains, fell on them, and life became ghastly, joyless, 
a pilgrim’s progress, a probation, beleaguered round with 
doleful histories of Adam’s fall and curse behind us; with 
doomsdays and purgatorial and penal fires before us; and 
the heart of the seer and the heart of the listener sank in them. 

It must be conceded that these are half-views of half-men. 
The world still wants its poet-priest, a reconciler, who shall not 
trifle, with Shakspeare the player, nor shall grope in graves, 
with Swedenborg the mourner; but who shall see, speak, and 
act, with equal inspiration. For knowledge will brighten the 
sunshine; right is more beautful than private affection; and 
love is compatible with universal wisdom. 

NOTES 

1 The comic magazine by that name is here referred to. 

2 The playwrights contemporary with Shakspeare, some of 
whom influenced him. See E. K. Chambers, The Elizabethan 
Stage , for an extended treatment, or Allardyce Nicoll, British 
Drama , for a briefer one. 

3 Brut, or Brutus, was a descendant of Tmeas, who was credited 
in popular legend with the founding of Britain. Arthur was the 
legendary Celtic hero celebrated in the romances of the Round 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 145 

Table, later confused with Brut. Brut stories are the Brut 
o' Angelterre, Roman de Brut by Wace, and Layamon’s Brut. 

4 Malone, Edward, a somewhat distinguished scholar, the 
friend of Johnson and Boswell, turned to Shakspeare criticism 
in later life. Emerson probably has reference to Malone’s Attempt 
to ascertain the Order in which the Plays of Shakespeare were 
written , published in 1778. He is known chiefly, however, for his 
critical edition of the plays (1741-1812). 

5 Henry VIII, III, iv. 

6 Henry VIII , V, iv. The whole scene: the christening of 
Queen Elizabeth. The compliment lies in Cranmer’s long speech 
predicting her greatness and England’s prosperity under her 
reign. 

7 Chaucer, Geoffrey, looked upon as the “Father of English 
Literature.’’ The first important poet to use the English language 
as his medium (ca. 1340-1400). 

8 See Milton’s II Penseroso, couplet 81. 

9 Pope, Alexander, English poet (1688-1744). 

10 Dryden, John, English poet, dramatist, and critic who re¬ 
discovered Chaucer, but failed to understand the rhythm of his 
language (1631-1700.) 

11 Had Emerson stopped to think, he should have seen the 
chronological absurdity of his remark, for both Lydgate and 
Caxton are later in date than Chaucer. The truth is that Chaucer 
got the story directly from Guido, who in turn got it from Benoit 
de Sainte-More. See T. R. Lounsbury, Studies in Chaucer, I, p. 
303. Lydgate, John. English poet (ca. 1370-1451). Caxton, 
William, earliest English printer (ca. 1422-1491). Guido di 
Colonna, a Sicilian poet and historian. He lived about 1250. 

12 A Trojan priest absurdly pretended by some ancient writers 
to have been the author of an Iliad or history of the Trojan War 
in prose. Probably such a work was written by some later writer. 
This no longer exists except in what purports to be its Latin trans¬ 
lation. 

13 Ovid. See page 98, note 58. 

14 Statius, Publius Papinius, Roman poet (ca. 61-96 A.D.). 

16 Italian poet (1304-1374). 

16 Boccaccio, Giovanni, Italian author (1313-1375). 

17 Provence was a former province of France. The ancient 
Provencal dialect was the first modern language, except Anglo- 
Saxon, to have a literature of its own. This dialect, known as the 
langue d'oc, was noted as the language of the troubadours. 

18 An allegorical romance in verse, begun by Guillaume de 
Lorris in the thirteenth century and finished by Jean de Meung in 
the fourteenth century. It is called the “French Iliad” and 
part of it was done into English by Chaucer. 

19 Again Emerson tells more than he knows. Chaucer indeed 
gives credit to one named Lollius, but he is certainly not Lollius 


146 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

of Urbino. Who he was no one knows. The immediate source of 
the poem is the Teseide of Boccaccio, from which the central theme 
is derived. The poem, however, is highly original in essential 
respects. See T. R. Lounsbury, Studies in Chaucer , II, pp. 
405-410. 

20 A poem of Chaucer. 

21 Marie de France, French poet and fabulist who flourished 
( ca . 1175-1190). 

22 A poem by Chaucer. 

23 Another unwarranted statement. Because Chaucer and 
Gower both use material from the same stories, which were com¬ 
mon property, they should not be charged with “stealing” from 
each other. Gower, an English poet (ca. 1325-1408). 

24 The English seat of Parliament. 

26 There were three Sir Robert Peels of note. The one probably 
meant here was an English statesman who flourished during the 
first half of the nineteenth century (1788-1850). 

26 These names are coupled here because both were philosophers 
who made popular appeal, though quite unlike in many respects. 
See page 23, note 53; page 56, note 9. 

27 See page 57, notes 39; page 99, note 85. Milton, John, 
the great English Puritan poet, author of Paradise Lost (1608- 
1647). 

28 The abode of oracles or prophets in ancient Greece, later the 
name of a city. 

29 See page 97, note 47. 

30 See page 22, note 34. 

31 Four holy books or collections of hymns of the Hindus. 
Veda means originally “knowledge.” 

32 An ancient Sanscrit fable writer, about which very little is 
known; the source of Lafontaine’s fables. 

33 The Cid was originally the life history of a Spanish hero 
named Ruy Diaz de Bivar, a Christian champion of the eleventh 
century in the wars with the Moors, nicknamed the Cid by Moor¬ 
ish admirers. Emerson may be referring to either the Spanish 
version or Corneille’s tragedy of that name. 

34 A Greek epic poem, the oldest and most celebrated extant, in 
twenty-four books, describing the siege of Troy. It was tradi¬ 
tionally ascribed to Homer, but probably was the work of several 
hands. 

36 A popular robber-hero of English folklore, whose deeds of 
heroism, chivalry, and roguery are celebrated in some of the 
English popular ballads. 

36 Refers to the popular songs and ballads of the Scotch High¬ 
lands. Sir Walter Scott’s Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border may 
have been in Emerson’s mind here. 

37 Founded in 1841 and dissolved in 1853. It published forty- 
eight volumes of Shakspeare material. 


SHAKSPEARE; OR, THE POET 147 

38 Mediaeval dramatic performances, treating sacred subjects, 
represented originally in churches and at solemn festivals. 

39 Or Gorboduc. Probably the first tragedy in the English 
tongue, by Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville, 1561. It is in 
blank verse and is based on a story in Holinshed’s Chronicles of 
England. It can be read in Manly’s Specimens of Pre-Shak- 
sperean Drama. 

40 Perhaps the earliest comedy in English. By “Mr. S., 
Master of Arts.” Probably this refers to William Stevenson. 
Produced in 1566. Also to be found in Manly’s Specimens of 
Pre-Shaksperean Drama. 

41 Modern research has done much for these old problems. 
See Sidney Lee, Life of Shakspeare , new ed.; Neilson and Thorn¬ 
dike, Facts About Shakspeare. 

42 Courtiers in the time of Queen Elizabeth. 

43 An English royal line (1485-1603) descended from Sir Owen 
Tudor of Wales, who married the widow of Henry V of England. 

44 An English dramatist, a contemporary and friend of Shak¬ 
speare ( ca. I573~ i6 37)- 

45 English statesman and poet (1568-1639). 

46 French reformer of the Calvinistic school (1519-1605). 

47 French critic and scholar (1559-1614). 

48 English statesman, and author of the Arcadia , a friend of 
Edmund Spenser (1554-1586). 

49 Robert Devereaux, the second earl to bear the title, at one 
time a favorite of Queen Elizabeth (1567-1601). 

50 English statesman (1613-1662). 

51 English writer, famous for his Compleat Angler (i593~ I 683). 

52 Dr. Donne, John, eminent divine and mystical poet (1573 - 
1631). 

53 English poet and dramatist (1618-1667). 

54 BeUarmine, Robert, Italian cardinal and writer (1542-1621). 

55 See page 123, note 23. 

56 English statesman and noted orator (1584-1643). 

57 English divine and critic (1584-1656). 

68 Kepler, Johannes, German astronomer (1571-1630). 

59 Vieta, Francois, French mathematician (1540-1603). 

60 Italian jurist, founded international law (1661-1603). 

61 Italian philosopher and historian (1552-1623). 

62 Arminius, Jacobus, Dutch theologian (1560-1609). 

63 Spenser, Edmund, author of the Faerie Queene (1584-1616). 

64 Beaumont, Francis, English dramatic poet (1584-1616). 

65 Massinger, Philip, English dramatist (1583-1640). 

66 Baron Edward of Cherbury, diplomat and philosopher (1583- 
1648); George, the poet (1593-1648). 

67 Marlow[_e\ Christopher,(Kit), English dramatist(1564-1593). 

68 Chapman, George, English dramatic poet and translator of 
Homer {ca. 1559-1634). 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


148 

69 Lessing, Gotthold Ephraim, German naturalist (1729-1781). 

70 Wieland, Christoph Martin, German poet and novelist 
(i 733 -i 8 i 3 ). 

71 Schlegel, August Wilhelm, German poet and scholar (1767— 

i 8 45 ). 

72 Coleridge , Samuel Taylor, English metaphysician and poet 
(1772-1834). 

73 The first regular playhouse in the district of Blackfriars, 
London. Erected 1596 by James Burbage, torn down in 1655; 
called a private theater, but used by Shakspeare’s company for 
public performances during the winter. 

74 Probably an unknown neighbor of Shakspeare. 

76 Francis Vayer de la Mothe (1586-1672). 

76 All these men are famous for their work in connection with 
the Elizabethan dramatists, and familiar to every student of 
Shakspeare and his contemporaries. See Dictionary of National 
Biography for a full account of their lives. 

77 The two leading theaters of London up to recent times. 
In the eighteenth century the only ones licensed by the court. 

78 Two famous old Boston theaters. 

79 All famous Shakspearean • actors who contributed some¬ 
thing to the present traditions of the acting of the great plays. 
See Dictionary of National Biography. 

80 Hamlet , I, iv. 

81 Localities in Shakspeare’s plays. 

82 A style characterized by massive, uneven blocks of stone and 
absence of mortar. The adjective, Cyclopean, means gigantic, 
very large. 

83 Phidias was the foremost sculptor of Greece. His sculptures 
adorn the Parthenon. 

84 Monastery churches or cathedrals in the pointed style of 
mediaeval architecture prevalent in Europe from the thirteenth 
to the sixteenth centuries. 

85 John Aubrey, an English antiquary (1626-1697); Nicholas 
Rowe, dramatist (1674-1718). 

86 Characters in Shakspeare’s plays. 

87 Frangois Joseph Talma was a distinguished French actor, 
a personal friend of Napoleon (1763-1826). 

88 Compare Bacon’s essay on Books , “Reading maketh a full 
man.” 

89 Daguerre , Louis Jacques Maude, French painter, inventor of 
the early form of photography known as the daguerreotype (1789- 
1851). 

90 Greek philosopher, founder of the Epicurean school of philos¬ 
ophy (third century B.C.). 

91 Tasso, Torquato, Italian poet (1544-1595). 

92 Cervantes, Miguel de, author of Don Quixote (1547-1616). 

93 The first state of the universe from which it is held that the 
cosmic order and harmony were evolved. 


VI 


NAPOLEON; OR, THE MAN OF THE WORLD 

A MONG the eminent persons of the nineteenth century, 
Bonaparte is far the best known and the most powerful; 
and owes his predominance to the fidelity with which he 
expresses the tone of thought and belief, the aims of the masses 
of active and cultivated men. It is Swedenborg’s theory that 
every organ is made up of homogeneous particles; or as it is 
sometimes expressed, every whole is made of similars; that is, 
the lungs are composed of infinitely small lungs; the liver, of 
infinitely small livers; the kidney, of little kidneys, etc. 
Following this analogy, if any man is found to carry with him 
the power and affections of vast numbers, if Napoleon is 
France, if Napoleon is Europe, it is because the people whom 
he sways are little Napoleons. 

In our society there is a standing antagonism between the 
conservative and the democratic classes; between those who 
have made their fortunes, and the young and the poor who 
have fortunes to make; between the interests of dead labor, — 
that is, the labor of hands long ago still in the grave, which 
labor is now entombed in money stocks, or in land and 
buildings owned by idle capitalists, — and the interests of 
living labor, which seeks to possess itself of land and buildings 
and money stocks. The first class is timid, selfish, illiberal, 
hating innovation, and continually losing numbers by death. 
The second class is selfish also, encroaching, bold, self-relying, 
always outnumbering the other and recruiting its numbers 
every hour by births. It desires to keep open every avenue to 
the competition of all, and to multiply avenues: the class of 
business men in America, in England, in France, and through- 

149 


150 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


out Europe; the class of industry and skill. Napoleon is its 
representative. The instinct of active, brave, able men, 
throughout the middle class every where, has pointed out 
Napoleon as the incarnate Democrat. He had their virtues 
and their vices; above all, he had their spirit or aim. That 
tendency is material, pointing at a sensual success and employ¬ 
ing the richest and most various means to that end; conver¬ 
sant with mechanical powers, highly intellectual, widely and 
accurately learned and skillful, but subordinating all intellec¬ 
tual and spiritual forces into means to a material success. To 
be the rich man, is the end. “God has granted,” says the 
Koran, “to every people a prophet in its own tongue.” Paris 
and London and New York, the spirit of commerce, of money 
and material power, were also to have their prophet; and 
Bonaparte was qualified and sent. 

Every one of the million readers of anecdotes or memoirs or 
lives of Napoleon, delights in the page, because he studies in 
it his own history. Napoleon is thoroughly modern, and, at 
the highest point of his fortunes, has the very spirit of the 
newspapers. He is. no saint, —to use his own word, “no 
capuchin,” 1 and he is no hero, in the high sense. The man in 
the street finds in him the qualities and powers of other men 
in the street. He finds him, like himself, by birth a citizen, 
who, by very intelligible merits, arrived at such a commanding 
position that he could indulge all those tastes which the 
common man possesses but is obliged to conceal and deny: 
good society, good books, fast traveling, dress, dinners, serv¬ 
ants without number, personal weight, the execution of his 
ideas, the standing in the attitudeof a benefactor to all persons 
about him, the refined enjoyments of pictures, statues, music, 
palaces, and conventional honors, — precisely what is agree¬ 
able to the heart of every man in the nineteenth century, this 
powerful man possessed. It is true that a man of Napoleon’s 
truth of adaption to the mind of the masses around him, be¬ 
comes not merely representative but actually a, monopolizer 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 151 

and usurper of other minds. Thus Mirabeau 2 plagiarized 
every good thought, every good word that was spoken in 
France. Dumont 3 relates that he sat in the gallery of the 
Convention 4 and heard Mirabeau make a speech. It struck 
Dumont that he could fit it with a peroration, which he wrote 
in pencil immediately, and showed it to Lord Elgin, 5 who sat 
by him. Lord Elgin approved it, and Dumont, in the evening, 
showed it to Mirabeau. Mirabeau read it, pronounced it 
admirable, and declared he would incorporate it into his 
harangue to-morrow, to the Assembly. “It is impossible,” 
said Dumont, “as, unfortunately, I have shown it to Lord 
Elgin.” “If you have shown it to Lord Elgin and to fifty 
persons beside, I shall still speak it tomorrow:” and he did 
speak it, with much effect, at the next day’s session. For 
Mirabeau, with his overpowering personality, felt that these 
things which his presence inspired were as much his own as if 
he had said them, and that his adoption of them gave them 
their weight. Much more absolute and centralizing was the 
successor to Mirabeau’s popularity and to much more than 
his predominence in France. Indeed, a man of Napoleon’s 
stamp almost ceases to have a private speech and opinion. 
He is so largely receptive, and is so placed, that he comes to be 
a bureau for all the intelligence, wit, and power of the age 
and country. He gains the battle; he makes the code; he 
makes the system of weights and measures; he levels the 
Alps; he builds the road. All distinguished engineers, savans, 6 
statists, report to him: so likewise do all good heads in every 
kind: he adopts the best measures, sets his stamp on them, 
and not these alone, but on every happy and memorable ex¬ 
pression. Every sentence spoken by Napoleon and every 
line of his writing, deserves reading, as it is the sense of 
France. 

Bonaparte was the idol of common men because he had in 
transcendent degree the qualities and powers of common men. 
There is a certain satisfaction in coming down to the lowest 


152 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


ground of politics, for we get rid of cant and hypocrisy. Bona¬ 
parte wrought, in common with that great class he repre¬ 
sented, for power and wealth, — but Bonaparte, specially, 
without any scruple as to means. All the sentiments which 
embarrass men’s pursuit of these objects, he set aside. The 
sentiments were for women and children. Fontanes, 7 • in 
1804, expressed Napoleon’s own sense, when in behalf of the 
Senate he addressed him. — “Sire, the desire of perfection is 
the worst disease that ever afflicted the human mind.” The 
advocates of liberty and progress are “ideologists”; —a word 
of contempt often in his mouth; — “ Necker 8 is an ideologist”: 
“Lafayette is an ideologist.” 

An Italian proverb, too well known, declares that “if you 
would succeed, you must not be too good.” It is an advant¬ 
age, within certain limits, to have renounced the dominion 
of the sentiments of pity, gratitude, and generosity; since 
what was an impassable bar to us, and still is to others, be¬ 
comes a convenient weapon for our purposes; just as the river 
which is a formidable barrier, winter transforms into the 
smoothest of roads. 

Napoleon renounced, once for all, sentiments and affections, 
and would help himself with his hands and his head. With 
him is no miracle and no magic. He is a worker in brass, in 
iron, in wood, in earth, in roads, in buildings, in money, and 
in troops, and a very consistent and wise mas ter-workman. 
He is never weak and literary, but acts with the solidity and 
the precision of natural agents. He has not lost his native 
sense and sympathy with things. Men give way before 
such a man, as before natural events. To be sure,, there are 
men enough who are immersed in things, as farmers, smiths, 
sailors, and mechanics generally; and we know how real and 
solid such men appear in the presence of scholars and gram¬ 
marians: but these men ordinarily lack the power of arrange¬ 
ment, and are like hands without a head. But Bonaparte 
superadded to this mineral and animal force, insight and 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 153 

generalization, so that men saw in him combined the natural 
and the intellectual power, as if the sea and land had taken 
flesh and begun to cipher. Therefore the land and sea seem 
to presuppose him. He came unto his own and they received 
him. This ciphering operative knows what he is working with 
and what is the product. He knows the properties of gold 
and iron, of wheels and ships, of troops and diplomatists, and 
required that each should do after its kind. 

The art of war was the game in which he exerted his arith¬ 
metic. It consisted, according to him, in having always more 
forces than the enemy, on the point where the enemy is 
attacked, or where he attacks: and his whole talent is strained 
by endless manoeuvre and evolution, to march always on the 
enemy at an angle, and destroy his forces in detail. It is 
obvious that a very small force, skillfully and rapidly man¬ 
oeuvring so as always to bring two men against one at the 
point of engagement, will be an overmatch for a much larger 
body of men. 

The times, his constitution and his early circumstances 
combined to develop this pattern democrat. He had the 
virtues of his class and the conditions for their activity. That 
common sense which no sooner respects any end than it finds 
the means to effect it; the delight in the use of means; in the 
choice, simplification, and combining of means; the directness 
and thoroughness of his work; the prudence with which all 
was seen and the energy with which all was done, make him 
the natural organ and head of what I may almost call, from its 
extent, the modern party. 

Nature must have far the greatest share in every success, 
and so in his.- Such a man was wanted, and such a man was 
born; a man of stone and iron, capable of sitting on horseback 
sixteen or seventeen hours, of going many days together with¬ 
out rest or food except by snatches, and with the speed and 
spring of a tiger in action; a man not embarrassed by any 
scruples; compact, instant, selfish, prudent, and of a per- 


154 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


ception which did not suffer itself to be baulked or misled by 
any pretences of others, or any superstition or any heat or 
haste of his own. “My hand of iron,” he said, “was not at the 
extremity of my arm, it was immediately connected with my 
head.” He respected the power of nature and fortune, and 
ascribed to it his superiority, instead of valuing himself, 
like inferior men, on his opinionativeness, and waging war 
with nature. His favorite rhetoric lay in allusion to his star; 
and he pleased himself, as well as the people, when he styled 
himself the “Child of Destiny.” “They.charge me,” he said, 
“with the commission of great crimes: Men of my stamp 
do not commit crimes. Nothing has been more simple than 
my elevation, ’t is in vain to ascribe it to intrigue or crime; it 
is owing to the peculiarity of the times and to my reputation 
of having fought well against the enemies of my country. I 
have always marched with the‘opinion of great masses and 
with events. Of what use then would crimes be to me?” 
Again he said, speaking of his son, “ My son cannot replace me; 
I could not replace myself. I am the creature of circum¬ 
stances.” ✓ j 

He had a directness of action never before combined with 
so much comprehension. He is a realist, terrific to all talkers 
and confused truth-obscuring persons. He sees where the 
matter hinges, throws himself on the precise point of resist¬ 
ance, and slights all other considerations. He is strong in the 
right manner, namely by insight. He never blundered into 
victory, but won his battles in his head before he won them 
on the field. His principal means are in himself. He asks 
counsel of no other. In 1796 he writes to the Directory: 9 
“I have conducted the campaign without consulting any one. 

I should have done no good if I had been under the necessity 
of conforming to the> notions of another person. I have gained 
some advantages over superior forces and when totally 
destitute of every thing, because, in the persuasion that your 
confidence was reposed in me, my actions were as prompt as 
my thoughts.” 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 155 

History is full, down to this day, of the imbecility of kings 
and governors. They are a class of persons much to be pitied, 
for they know not what they should do. The weavers strike 
for bread, and the king and his ministers, knowing not what 
to do, meet them with bayonets. But Napoleon understood 
his business. Here was a man who in each moment and 
emergency knew What to do next. It is an immense comfort 
and refreshment to the spirits, not only of kings, but of citi¬ 
zens. Few men have any next; they live from hand to 
mouth without plan, and are ever at the end of their line, and 
after each action wait for an impulse from abroad. Napoleon 
had been the first man of the world, if his ends had been 
purely public. As he is, he inspires confidence and vigor by 
the extraordinary unity of his action. He is firm, sure, self- 
denying, self-postponing, sacrificing everything, — money, 
troops, generals, and his own safety also, to his "aim; not 
misled, like common adventurers, by the splendor of his own 
means. “Incidents ought not to govern policy,” he said, 
“but policy, incidents.” “To be hurried away by every 
event is to have no political system at all.” His victories 
are only so many doors, and he never for a moment lost sight 
of his way onward, in the dazzle and uproar of the present 
circumstance. He knew what to do and he flew to his mark. 
He would shorten a straight line to come at his object. Hor¬ 
rible anecdotes may no doubt be collected from his history, of 
the price at which he bought his successes; but he must not 
therefore be set down as cruel, but only as one who knew no 
impediment to his will; not bloodthirsty, not cruel, — but 
woe to what thing or person stood in his way! Not blood¬ 
thirsty, but not sparing of blood, — and pitiless. He saw 
only the object: the obstacle must give way. “Sire, General 
Clarke 10 can not combine with General Junot, 11 for the 
dreadful fire of the Austrian battery.” — “Let him carry the 
battery.” — “Sire, every regiment that approaches the heavy 
artillery is sacrificed: Sire, what orders?” — “Forward, 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


156 

forward!” Seruzier, a colonel of artillery, gives, in his “Mili¬ 
tary Memoirs,” the following sketch of a scene after the 
battle of Austerlitz. 12 — “At the moment in which the 
Russian army was making its retreat, painfully, but in good 
order, on the ice of the lake, the Emperor Napoleon came 
riding at full speed toward the artillery. ‘You are losing 
time,’ he cried; ‘fire upon those masses; they must be en¬ 
gulfed : fire upon the ice! ’ The order remained unexecuted 
for ten minutes. In vain several officers and myself were 
placed on the slope of a hill to produce the effect: their balls 
and mine rolled upon the ice without breaking it up. Seeing 
that, I tried a simple method of elevating light howitzers. 
The almost perpendicular fall of the heavy projectiles pro¬ 
duced the desired effect. My method was immediately fol¬ 
lowed by the adjoining batteries, and in less than no time we 
* burried ’ some ‘ thousands of Russians and Austrians under 
the waters of the lake.’ ” * 

In the plenitude of his resources, every obstacle seemed to 
vanish. “There shall be no Alps,” he said; and he built his 
perfect roads, climbing by graded galleries their steepest 
precipices, until Italy was as open to Paris as any town in 
France. He laid his bones to, and wrought for his crown. 
Having decided what was to be done, he did that with might 
and main. He put out all his strength. He risked everything 
and spared nothing, neither ammunition, nor money, nor 
troops, nor generals, nor himself. 

We like to see every thing do its office after its kind, whether 
it be a milch-cow or a rattle-snake; and if fighting be the best 
mode of adjusting national differences (as large majorities 
of men seem to agree), certainly Bonaparte was right in 
making it thorough. The grand principle of war, he said, 
was that an army ought always to be ready, by day and by 
night and at all hours, to make all the resistance it is capable 

* (Note by Emerson: Some — As I quote at second hand, and 
cannot procure Seruzier, I dare not adopt the high figure I find.) 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 157 

of making. He never economized his ammunition, but, on a 
hostile position, rained a torrent of iron, — shells, balls, 
grape-shot, — to annihilate all defence. On any point of 
resistence he concentrated squadron on squadron in over¬ 
whelming numbers until it was swept out of existence. To a 
regiment of horse-chasseurs at Lobenstein, 13 two days before 
the battle of Jena, 14 Napoleon said, “My lads, you must not 
fear death; when soldiers brave death, they drive him into 
the enemy’s ranks.” In the fury of assault, he no more spared 
himself. He went to the edge of his possibility. It is plain 
that in Italy he did what he could and all that he could.. He 
came, several times, within an inch of ruin; and his own 
person was all but lost. He was flung into the marsh at 
Areola. 15 The Austrians were between him and his troops, 
in the melee, 16 and he was brought off with desperate efforts. 
At Lonato, 17 and at other places, he was on the point of being 
taken prisoner. He fought sixty battles. He had never 
enough. Each victory was a new weapon. “My power 
would fall, were I not to support it by new achievements. 
Conquest has made me what I am, and conquest must main¬ 
tain me.” He felt, with every wise man, that as much life is 
needed for conservation as for creation. We are always in 
peril, always in a bad plight, just on the edge of destruction 
and only to be saved by invention and courage. 

This vigor was guarded and tempered by the coldest 
prudence and punctuality. A thunderbolt in the attack, he 
was found invulnerable in his intrenchments. His very 
attack was never the inspiration of courage, but the result 
of calculation. His idea of the best defence consists in being 
still the attacking party. “My ambition,” he says, “was 
great, but was of a cold nature.” In one of his conversations 
with Las Casas, 18 he remarked, “As to moral courage, I have 
rarely met with the two-o’clock-in-the-morning kind: I mean 
unprepared courage; that which is necessary on an unexpected 
occasion, and which, in spite of the most unforeseen events, 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


158 

leaves full freedom of judgment and decision and he did not 
hesitate to declare that he was himself eminently endowed 
with this two-o’clock-in-the-morning courage, and that he 
had met with few persons equal to himself in this respect. 

Everything depended on the nicety of his combinations, and 
the stars were not more punctual than his arithmetic. His 
personal attention descended to the smallest particulars. 
“At Montebello, 19 I ordered Kellermann 20 to attack with 
eight hundred horse, and with these he separated the six 
thousand Hungarian grenadiers, before the very eyes of the 
Austrian cavalry. This cavalry was half a league off and 
required a quarter of an hour to arrive on the field of action, 
and I have observed that it is always these quarters of an 
hour that decide the fate of a battle.” “Before he fought a 
battle, Bonaparte thought little about what he should do in 
case of success, but a great deal about what he should do in 
case of a reverse of fortune.” The same prudence and good 
sense mark all his behavior. His instructions to his secretary 
at the Tuileries 21 are worth remembering. “During the 
night, enter my chamber as seldom as possible. Do not 
awaken me when you have any good news to communicate;, 
with that there is no hurry. But when you bring bad news, 
rouse me instantly, for then there is not a moment to be 
lost.” It was a whimsical economy of the same kind which 
dictated his practice, when general in Italy, in regard to his 
burdensome correspondence. He directed Bourrienne 22 to 
leave all letters unopened for three weeks, and then observed 
with satisfaction how large a part of the correspondence had 
thus disposed of itself and no longer required an answer. 
His achievement of business was immense, and enlarges the 
known powers of man. There have been many working kings, 
from Ulysses 23 to William of Orange, 24 but none who accom¬ 
plished a tithe of this man’s performance. 

To these gifts of nature, Napoleon added the advantage 
of having been born to a private and humble fortune. In his 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 159 

later days he had the weakness of wishing to add to his crowns 
and badges the prescription of aristocracy: but he knew his 
debt to his austere education, and made no secret of his con¬ 
tempt for the born kings, and for “the hereditary asses,” as 
he coarsely styled the Bourbons. 25 He said that “in their exile 
they had learned nothing, and forgot nothing.” Bonaparte 
had passed through all the degrees of military service, but also 
was citizen before he was emperor, and so has the key to 
citizenship. His remarks and estimates discover the informa¬ 
tion and justness of measurement of the middle class. Those 
who had to deal with him found that he was not to be imposed 
upon, but could cipher as well as another man. ‘This appears 
in all parts of his Memoirs, dictated at St. Helena. 26 When 
the expenses of the empress, of his household, of his palaces, 
had accumulated great debts, Napoleon examined the bills 
of the creditors himself, detected overcharges and errors, and 
reduced the claims by considerable sums. 

His grand weapon, namely the millions whom he directed, 
he owed to the representative character which clothed him. 
He interests us as he stands for France and for Europe; and he 
exists as captain and king only as far as the Revolution, or the 
interest of the industrious masses, found an organ and a 
leader in him. In the social interests, he knew the meaning 
and the value of labor, and threw himself naturally on that 
side. I like the incident by one of his biographers at St. 
Helena. “When walking with Mrs. Balcombe, 27 some serv¬ 
ants, carrying heavy boxes, passed by on the road, and 
Mrs. Balcombe desired them, in rather an angry tone, to 
keep back. Napoleon interfered, saying, 'Respect the bur¬ 
den, Madam.’” In the time of the empire he directed at¬ 
tention to the improvement and embellishment of the markets 
of the capital. “The market-place,” he said, “is the Louvre 28 
of the common people.” The principal works that have 
survived him are his magnificent roads. He filled the troops 
with his spirit, and a sort of freedom and companionship grew 


i6o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


up between him and them, which the forms of his court never 
permitted between the officers and himself. They performed, 
under his eye, that which no others could do. The best 
document of his relation to his troops is the order of the day 
on the morning of the battle of Austerlitz, in which Napoleon 
promises the troops that he will keep his person out of reach 
of fire. This declaration, which is the reverse of that ordi¬ 
narily made by generals and sovereigns on the eve of a battle, 
sufficiently explains the devotion of the army to their leader. 

But though there is in particulars this identity between 
Napoleon and the mass of the people, his real strength lay in 
their conviction that he was their representative in his genius 
and aims, not only when he courted, but when he controlled, 
and even when he decimated them by his conscriptions. He 
knew as well as any Jacobin 29 in France, how to philosophize 
on liberty and equality; and when allusion was made to the 
precious blood of the centuries, which was spilled by the 
killing of the Due d’Enghien, 30 he suggested, “Neither is my 
blood ditch-water.” People felt that no longer the throne was 
occupied and the land sucked of its nourishment, by a small 
class of legitimates, secluded from all community with the 
children of the soil, and holding the ideas and superstitions of 
a long-forgotten state of society. Instead of the vampyre, a 
man of themselves held, in the Tuileries, knowledge and ideas 
like their own, opening of course to them and their children 
all places of power and trust. The day of sleepy, selfish 
policy, ever narrowing the means and opportunities of young 
men, was ended, and a day of expansion and demand was 
come. A market for all the powers and productions of man 
was opened; brilliant prizes glittered in the eyes of youth and 
talent. The old, iron-bound, feudal France was changed into 
a young Ohio or New York; and those who smarted under the 
immediate rigors of the new monarch, pardoned them as the 
necessary severities of the military system which had driven 
out the oppressor. And even when the majority of the people 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 161 

had begun to ask whether they had really gained anything 
under the exhausting levies of men and money of the new 
master, the whole talent of the country, in every rank and 
kindred, took his part and defended him as its natural patron. 
In 1814, when advised to rely on the higher classes, Napoleon 
said to those around him, “Gentlemen, in the situation in 
which I stand, my only nobility is the rabble of the Fau¬ 
bourgs.” 31 

Napoleon met this natural expectation. The necessity of his 
position required a hospitality to every sort of talent, and its 
appointment to trusts; and his feeling went along with this 
policy. Like every superior person, he undoubtedly felt a 
desire for men and compeers, and a wish to measure his power 
with other masters, and an impatience with fools and under¬ 
lings. In Italy, he sought for men and found none. “Good 
God!” he said, “how rare men are! There are eighteen 
millions in Italy, and I have with difficulty found two, — 
Dandolo 32 and Melzi. ” 33 In later years, with larger ex¬ 
perience, his respect for mankind was not increased. In a 
moment of bitterness he said to one of his oldest friends, 
“Men deserve the contempt with which they inspire me. I 
have only to put some gold lace on the coat of my virtuous 
republicans and they immediately become just what I wish 
them.” This impatience of levity was, however, an oblique 
tribute of respect to those able persons who commanded his 
regard not only when he found them friends and coadjutors 
but also when they resisted his will. He could not confound 
Fox 34 and Pitt, 35 Carnot, 36 Lafayette 37 and Bernadotte, 38 
with the danglers of his court; and in spite of the detraction 
which his systematic egotism dictated toward the great 
captains who conquered with and for him, ample acknowl¬ 
edgements are made by him to Lannes, 39 Duroc, Kleber, 
Dessaix, Massena, Murat, Ney, and Augereau. If he felt 
himself their patron and the founder of their fortunes, as 
when he said, “I made my generals out of mud,” — he could 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


162 

not hide his satisfaction in receiving from them a seconding 
and support commensurate with the grandeur of his enterprise. 
In the Russian campaign he was so much impressed by the 
courage and resources of Marshal Ney, that he said, “ I have 
two hundred millions in my coffers, and I would give them all 
for Ney.” The characters which he has drawn of several 
of his marshals are discriminating, and though they did not 
content the insatiable vanity of the French officers, are no 
doubt substantially just. And in fact every species of merit 
was sought and advanced under his government. “I know,” 
he said, “ the depth and draught of water 40 of every one of my 
generals.” Natural power was sure to be well received at his 
court. Seventeen men in his time were raised from common 
soldiers to the rank of king, marshal, duke, or general; and the 
crosses of his legion of Honor were given to personal valor, and 
not to family connexion. “When soldiers have been baptized 
in the fire of a battle-field, they have all one rank in my eyes.” 

When a natural king becomes a titular king, everybody is 
pleased and satisfied. The Revolution entitled the strong 
populace of the Faubourg St. Antoine, and every horse-boy 
and powder-monkey in the army, to look on Napoleon as 
flesh of his flesh and the creature of his party; but there is 
something in the success of grand talent which enlists an 
universal sympathy. For in the prevalence of sense and 
spirit over stupidity and malversation, all reasonable men 
have an interest; and as intellectual beings we feel the air 
purified by the electric shock, when material force is over¬ 
thrown by intellectual energies. As soon as we are removed 
out of the reach of local and accidental partialities, Man feels 
that Napoleon fights for him; these are honest victories; 
this strong steam-engine does our work. Whatever appeals 
to the imagination, by transcending the ordinary limits of 
human ability, wonderfully encourages and liberates us. This 
capacious head, revolving and disposing sovereignly trains of 
affairs, and animating such multitudes of agents; this eye 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 163 

which looked through Europe; this prompt invention; this 
inexhaustible resource:—what events! what romantic pic¬ 
tures! What strange situations! — when spying the Alps, by 
a sunset in the Sicilian sea; drawing up his army for battle 
in sight of the Pyramids, and saying to his troops, “From, 
the tops of those pyramids, forty centuries look doWn on 
you ”; fording the Red Sea; wading in the gulf of the Isthmus 
of Suez. On the shore of Ptolemais, 41 gigantic projects agi¬ 
tated him. “Had Acre 42 fallen, I should have changed the 
face of the world.’' His army, on the night of the battle of Aus- 
terlitz, which was the anniversary of his inauguration as Em¬ 
peror, presented him with a bouquet of forty standards 
taken in the fight. Perhaps it is a little puerile, the pleasure 
he took in making these contrasts glaring; as when hp pleased 
himself with making kings wait in his antechambers, at Til¬ 
sit, 43 at Paris, and at Erfurt. 44 We cannot, in the universal 
imbecility, indecision, and indolence of men, sufficiently con¬ 
gratulate ourselves on this strong and ready actor who took 
occasion by the beard, and showed us how much may be 
accomplished by the mere force of such virtues as all men 
possess in less degrees; namely, by punctuality, by personal 
attention, by courage and thoroughness. “The Austrians,” 
he said, “do not know the value of time.” I should cite 
him, in his earlier years, as a model of prudence. His power 
does not consist in any wild and extravagant force; in any 
enthusiasm like Mahomet, or singular power of persuasion; 
but in the exercise of common sense on each emergency, in¬ 
stead of abiding by laws and customs. The lesson he teaches 
is that which vigor always teaches; — that there is always 
room for it. To what heaps of cowardly doubts is not that 
man’s life an answer? When he appeared it was the belief 
of all military men that there could be nothing new in war; 
as it is the belief of men to-day that nothing new can be 
undertaken in politics, or in church, or in letters, or in trade, 
or in farming, or in our social manners and customs; and as 


164 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

it is at all times the belief of society that the world is used 
up. |But Bonaparte knew better than society; and more¬ 
over knew that he knew better. I think all men know better 
than they do; know that the institutions that we so volubly 
commend are go-carts and baubles; but they dare not trust 
their presentiments. Bonaparte relied on his own sense, and 
did not care a bean for other people’s. The world treated his 
novelties just as it treats everybody’s novelties, — made 
infinite objection, mustered all the impediments; but he 
snapped his finger at their objections. “What creates great 
difficulty,” he remarks, “in the profession of the land-com¬ 
mander, is the necessity of feeding so many men and animals. 
If he allows himself to be guided by the commissaries he will 
never stif, and all his expeditions will fail.” An example of 
his common sense is what he says of the passage of the Alps 
in winter, which all writers, one repeating after the other, had 
described as impracticable. “The winter,” says Napoleon, 
“is not the most unfavorable season for the passage of lofty 
mountains. The snow is then firm, the weather settled, and 
there is nothing to fear from avalanches, the real and only 
danger to be apprehended in the Alps. On those high moun¬ 
tains there are often very fine days in December, of a dry 
cold, with extreme calmness in the air.” Read his account, 
too, of the way in which battles are gained. “ In all battles a 
moment occurs when the bravest troops, after having made 
the greatest efforts, feel inclined to run. That terror proceeds 
from a want of confidence in their own courage, and it only 
requires a slight opportunity, a pretence, to restore confidence 
to them. The art is, to give rise to the opportunity and to 
invent the pretence. At Areola I won the battle with twenty- 
five horsemen. I seized that moment of lassitude, gave every 
man a trumpet, and gained the day with this handful. You 
see that two armies are two bodies which meet and endeavor 
to frighten each other; a moment of panic occurs, and that 
moment must be turned to advantage. When a man has been 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 165 

present in many actions, he distinguishes that moment without 
difficulty: it is as easy as casting up an addition.” 

This deputy of the nineteenth century added to his gifts a 
capacity for speculation on general topics. He delighted in 
running through the range of practical, of literary, and of 
abstract questions. His opinion is always original and to the 
purpose. On the voyage to Egypt he liked, after dinner, to 
fix on three or four persons to support a proposition, and as 
many to oppose it. He gave a subject, and the discussions 
turned on questions of religion, the different kinds of govern¬ 
ment, and the art of war. One day he asked whether the 
planets were inhabited? On another, what was the age of 
the world? Then he proposed to*consider the probability of the 
destruction of the globe, either by water or by fire: at another 
time, the truth or fallacy of presentiments, and the interpre¬ 
tation of dreams. He was very fond of talking of religion. 
In 1806 he conversed with Fournier, bishop of Montpellier, 
on matters of theology. There were two points on which they 
could not agree, viz. that of hell, and that of salvation out of 
the pale of the church. The Emperor told Josephine 45 that 
he disputed like a devil on these two points, on which the 
bishop was inexorable. To the philosophers he readily yielded 
all that was proved against religion as the work of men and 
time, but he could not hear of materialism. One fine night, on 
deck, amid a clatter of materialism, Bonaparte pointed to 
the stars, and said, “You may talk as long as you please, 
gentlemen, but who made all that?” He delighted in the 
conversation of men of science, particularly of Monge 46 and 
Berthollet; 47 but the men of letters he slighted; they were 
“manufacturers of phrases.” Of medicine too he was fond of 
talking, and with those of its practioners whom he most 
esteemed, — with Corvisart 48 at Paris, and with Antono- 
marchi 49 at St. Helena. “Believe me,” he said to the last, 
“we had better leave off all these remedies: life is a fortress 
which neither you nor I know anything about. Why throw 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


166 

obstacles in the way of its defence? Its own means are su¬ 
perior to all the apparatus of your laboratories. Corvisart 
candidly agreed with me that all your filthy mixtures are 
good for nothing. Medicine is a collection of uncertain 
prescriptions, the results of which, taken collectively, are 
more fatal than useful to mankind. Water, air, and cleanli¬ 
ness are the chief articles in my pharmacoepia.” 

His memoirs, dictated to Count Montholon 60 and General 
Gourgaud 51 at St. Helena, have great value, after all the 
deduction that it seems is to be made from them on account of 
his known disingenuousness. He has the good-nature of 
strength and conscious superiority. I admire his simple, clear 
narrative of his battles;— good as Caesar’s; his good-natured 
and sufficiently respectful account, of Marshal Wurmser 52 and 
his other antagonists; and his own equality as a writer to his 
varying subject. The most agreeable portion is the Campaign 
in Egypt. 

He had hours of thought and wisdom. In intervals of 
leisure, either in the camp or the palace, Napoleon appears 
as a man of genius directing on abstract questions the native 
appetite for truth and the impatience of words he was wont 
to show in war. He could enjoy every play of invention, a 
romance, a bon mot , as well as a stratagem in a campaign. He 
delighted to fascinate Josephine and her ladies, in a dim- 
lighted apartment, by the terrors of a fiction to which his 
voice and dramatic power lent every addition. 

I call Napoleon the agent or attorney of the middle class of 
modern society; of the throng who fill the markets, shops, 
counting-houses, manufactories, ships, of the modern world, 
aiming to be rich. He was the agitator, the destroyer of 
prescription, the internal improver, the liberal, the radical, the 
inventor of means, the opener of doors and markets, the sub- 
verter of monopoly and abuse. Of course the rich and aristo¬ 
cratic did not like him. England the centre of capital, and 
Rome and Austria, centres of tradition and genealogy, op- 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 167 

posed him. The consternation of the dull and conservative 
classes, the terror of the foolish old men and old women of 
the Roman conclave, who in their despair took hold of any¬ 
thing, and would cling to red-hot iron, — the vain attempts 
of statists to amuse and deceive him, of the emperor of Austria 
to bribe him; and the instinct of the young, ardent, and 
active men every where, which pointed him out as the giant of 
the middle class, make his history bright and commanding. 
He had the virtues of the masses of his constituents: he had 
also their vices. I am sorry that the brilliant picture has its 
reverse. But that is the fatal quality which we discover in our 
pursuit of wealth, that it is treacherous, and is bought by the 
breaking or weakening of the sentiments; and it is inevitable 
that we should find the same fact in the history of this cham¬ 
pion, who proposed to himself simply a brilliant career, with¬ 
out any stipulation or scruple concerning the means. 

Bonaparte was singularly destitute of generous sentiments. 
The highest-placed individual in the most cultivated age and 
population of the world, — he has not the merit of common 
truth and honesty. He is unjust to his generals; egotistic 
and monopolizing; meanly stealing the credit of their great 
actions from Kellermann, from Bernadotte; intriguing to 
involve his faithful Junot in hopeless bankruptcy, in order to 
drive him to a distance from Paris, because the familiarity of 
his manners offends the new pride of his throne. He is a 
boundless liar. The official paper, his “Moniteur,” and all 
his bulletins, are proverbs for saying what he wished to be 
believed; and worse, — he sat, in his premature old age, in his 
lonely island, coldly falsifying facts and dates and characters, 
and giving to history a theatrical eclat. 63 Like all Frenchmen 
he has a passion for stage effect. Every action that breathes 
of generosity is poisoned by this calculation. His star, his love 
of glory, his doctrine of the immortality of the soul, are all 
French. “I must dazzle and astonish. If I were to give the 
liberty of the press, my power could not last three days.” 


i68 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


To make a great noise is his favorite design. “A great repu¬ 
tation is a great noise: the more there is made, the farther 
off it is heard. Laws, institutions, monuments, nations, all 
fall; but the noise continues, and resounds in after ages.” 
His doctrine of immortality is simply fame. His theory of 
influence is not flattering. “There are two levers for moving 
men, — interest and fear. Love is a silly infatuation, depend 
upon it. Friendship is but a name. I love nobody. I do not 
even love my brothers: perhaps Joseph 64 a little, from habit, 
and because he is my elder; and Duroc, I love him too; but 
why? — because his character pleases me: he is stern and 
resolute, and I believe the fellow never shed a tear. For my 
part I know very well that I have no true friends. As long 
as I continue to be what I am, I may have as many pretended 
friends as I please. Leave sensibility to women; but men 
should be firm in heart and purpose, or they should have 
nothing to do with war and government.” He was thoroughly 
unscrupulous. He would steal, slander, assassinate, drown, 
and poison, as his interest dictated. He had no generosity, 
but mere vulgar hatred; he was intensely selfish; he was 
perfidious; he cheated at cards; he was a prodigious gossip, 
and opened letters, and delighted in his infamous police, and 
rubbed his hands with joy when he had intercepted some 
morsel of intelligence concerning the men and women about 
him, boasting that “he knew everything”; and interfered 
with the cutting the dresses of the women; and listened after 
the hurrahs and the compliments of the street, incognito. 
His manners were coarse. He treated women with low 
familiarity. He had the habit of pulling their ears and pinch¬ 
ing their cheeks when he was in good humor, and of pulling 
the ears and whiskers of men, and of striking and horse-play 
with them, to his last days. It does not appear that he listened 
at key-holes, or at least that he was caught at it. In short, 
when you have penetrated through all the circles of power and 
splendor, you were not dealing with a gentleman, at last; but 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 169 

with an impostor and a rogue; and he fully deserves the epi¬ 
thet of Jupiter Scaping or a sort of Scamp Jupiter. 

In describing the two parties into which modern society 
divides itself, — the democrat and the conservative, — I say, 
Bonaparte represents the Democrat, or the party of men of 
business, against the stationary or conservative party. I 
omitted then to say, what is material to the statement, namely 
that these two parties differ only as young and old. The 
democrat is a young conservative; the conservative is an old 
democrat. The aristocrat is the democrat ripe and gone 
to seed; — because both parties stand on the one ground of 
the supreme value of property, which one endeavors to get, 
and the other to keep. Bonaparte may be said to represent 
the whole history of this party, its youth and its age; yes, and 
with poetic justice its fate, in his own. The counter-revolu¬ 
tion, the counter-party, still waits for its organ and represent¬ 
ative, in a lover and a man of truly public and universal aims. 

Here was an experiment, under the most favorable con¬ 
ditions, of the powers of intellect without conscience. Never 
was such a leader so endowed and so weaponed; never leader 
found such aids and followers. And what was the result 
of this vast talent and power, of these immense armies, burned 
cities, squandered treasures, immolated millions of men, of 
this demoralized Europe? It came to no result. All passed 
away like the smoke of his artillery, and left no trace. He 
left France smaller, poorer, feebler than he found it; and the 
whole contest for freedom was to be begun again. The 
attempt was in principle suicidal. France served him with 
life and limb and estate, as long as it could identify its in¬ 
terest with him; but when Inen saw that after victory was 
another war; 56 after the destruction of armies, new con¬ 
scriptions ; and they who had toiled so desperately were never 
nearer to the rewa’rd, — they could not spend what they had 
earned, nor repose on their down-beds, nor strut in their 
chateaux, — they deserted him. Men found that his absorb- 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


170 

ing egotism was deadly to all other men. It resembled the 
torpedo, which inflicts a succession of shocks on any one who 
takes hold of it, producing spasms which contract the muscles 
of the hand, so that the man cannot open his fingers; and the 
animal inflicts new and more violent shocks, until he paralyzes 
and kills his victim. So this exorbitant egotist narrowed, 
improverished, and absorbed the power and existence of those 
who served him; and the universal cry of France and of 
Europe in 1814 was, “Enough of him”; “Assez de Bona¬ 
parte.” 4 

It was not Bonaparte’s fault. He did all that in him lay to 
live and thrive without moral principle. It was the nature of 
things, the eternal law of man and of the world which baulked 
and ruined him; and the result, in a million experiments, will 
be the same. Every experiment, by multitudes or by in¬ 
dividuals, that has a sensual and selfish aim, will fail. The 
pacific Fourier 57 will be as inefficient as the pernicious Na¬ 
poleon. As long as our civilization is essentially one of 
property, of fences, of exclusiveness, it will be mocked by 
delusions. Our riches will leave us sick; there will be bitter¬ 
ness in our laughter, and our wine will burn our mouth. Only 
'that good profits which we can taste with all doors open, and 
which serves all men. 


NOTES 

1 A Franciscan monk who practiced the more austere rule of 
Matteo di Bassi, whose followers wore pointed hoods, known as 
“capuches,” which gave this group their name. Later a separate 
order. 

2 Mirabeau, Honore Gabriel Victor Riquetti, Comte de, leader 
of the French revolutionists, noted for his oratory (1749-1791). 

3 Dumont, Pierre fitienne Louis, supporter of Mirabeau. He 
became disgusted with the violence and cruelty of the revolution¬ 
ists and withdrew to England (1759-1829). 

4 The legislative body that governed France (1792-1795) and 
abolished royalty. 

6 Lord Elgin, Thomas Bruce, seventh Earl of Elgin, British 
ambassador and antiquarian, responsible for the collection of 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 171 

Greek ornamental sculpture and friezes known as the Elgin 
Marbles (1766-1841). 

6 The French form; the English form is savantes, “learned 
men.” 

7 Fontanes , Louis, Marquis de, French poet and statesman 
(1757-1821). 

8 Necker , Jacques, French financier and statesman, father of 
Madame de Stael (1732-1804). 

9 The governing committee of five men as provided by the 
French constitution of 1795 in the new republic. 

10 General Clarke , Henri Jacques Guillaume, Count of Hune- 
bourge, Duke of Feltre, marshal of France (1765-1818). 

11 General Junot, Androche, Duke of Abrantes, marshal of 
France (1771-1813). 

12 December 2, 1805, between Napoleon and allied Austrian 
and Russian forces. Austerlitz is a town of Moravia, now a part of 
Czecho-Slovakia. 

13 A town in Germany. 

14 October 14, 1806, against the Prussians. Jena is situated on 
the Saale River in the duchy of Saxe-Weimar, Germany. 

15 A village in northern Italy where Napoleon won a victory 
over the Austrians, November 15-17, 1796. 

16 General hand-to-hand fight. 

17 A town in Brescia, province of Lombardy, Italy, where the 
Austrians were defeated by Napoleon in 1796. 

18 Las Casas , Marie Joseph Emmanuel Augustin Dieudonne, 
Comte de, French naval captain and historian, with Napoleon at 
St. Helena (1766-1842). 

19 A village in Pavia province in northern Italy. 

20 Kellermann, Francois Christophe, Duke of Valmy, distin- 
quished French general (1735-1820). 

21 One of the royal palaces, located near the Louvre, built by 
Catherine de Medici, 1564. At one time used as a parliament 
house. Destroyed during the Commune, 1871. Gardens on the 
site since 1883. 

22 Bourrienne, Louis Antoine Favelet de, French politician and 
writer, at one time a friend of Napoleon; wrote famous Memoirs 
of Bourrienne (1769-1834). 

23 Mythical hero, king of Ithaca, engaged in the Trojan War, 
hero of Homer’s Odyssey. 

24 William Henry of Nassau, Prince of Orange, joint sovereign 
with Mary II of England (1650-1702). 

25 The family name of the royal family descended from Louis 
IX of France; deposed during the French Revolution. 

26 British Island in the south Atlantic where Napoleon was 
exiled, 1815-1821. 

27 Wife of an elderly merchant at St. Helena and mother of 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


172 

two young daughters with whom Napoleon played at blind man’s 
buff. Napoleon often spent his evenings at the Balcombe home. 

28 Situated at Paris, one of the largest groups of buildings in the 
world, a palace in ancient times. Now houses many great col¬ 
lections of art as well as public offices. 

29 A name given members of the “Society of Friends of the 
Constitution,” a revolutionary group, because the meeting place 
was in an old Jacobin convent in Paris. This society organized 
the Reign of Terror. 

30 One of the black marks against Napoleon. The duke was the 
last of the Bourbon family. He was executed at Vincennes, 
March, 1804, on suspicion of conspiracy. This act turned many 
people against Napoleon. 

31 Refers to the attack of the common mob from the Faubourgs 
(suburbs), on the convention which had met for the reorganiza¬ 
tion of the government on less radical lines. The mob was re¬ 
pelled but not without much bloodshed, and France came under 
the control of the middle class. 

32 Dandolo, Enrico, blind doge of Venice ( ca . 1108-1205). 

33 Melzi, Francesco, friend and pupil of Leonardo da Vinci. 

34 Fox , Charles James, English statesman and orator (1749- 
1806). 

35 Pitt , William, English statesman and orator (1759-1806). 

36 Carnot , Lazare Nicholas Marguerite, French general and 
statesman (1753-1853). 

37 Lafayette, See page 22 ; note 40. 

38 Bernadotte, Jean Baptiste Jules, marshal of France. Charles 
XIV, king of Sweden and Norway (1764-1844). 

39 All were officers under Napoleon. 

40 Napoleon is using the nautical term, of course, as applied to 
the efficiency of a ship. 

41 Roman name of an ancient city and seaport of Syria. 

42 The modern name for Ptolemais. 

43 A manufacturing town in East Prussia where Napoleon con¬ 
cluded a treaty of peace with the sovereigns of Russia and Prussia, 
1807. 

44 A district in Saxony. 

45 Marie Josephe-Rose Tasher de la Pagerie, empress of France, 
widow of Viscount Beauharnais, married Napoleon I, 1796; 
divorced, 1809 (1763-1814). 

. 4 J Monge, Gaspard, Count of Peluse, celebrated mathema¬ 
tician, the creator of descriptive geometry (1746-1818). 

47 Berthollet, Claude Louis de, French chemist (1748-1822). 

48 Corvisart- Desmarets, Jean Nicholas, French physician (1755- 
1821). 

49 Antonomarchi (Antommarchi) Francesco, Napoleon’s own 
surgeon at St. Helena. 

60 Another of Napoleon’s generals, who shared his exile and 


NAPOLEON; THE MAN OF THE WORLD 173 

wrote accounts of Napoleon’s life at St. Helena (1782-1853). 

61 Also on Napoleon’s staff. He cooperated with Montholon 
in publishing Napoleon’s Memoirs. 

62 Marshal Wurmser , Dagobert Sigismund (Count), Austrian 
general (1724-1797). 

53 Showiness of achievement, brilliancy of conduct. 

54 The brother of Napoleon. He became king of Naples in 
1806 and of Spain in 1808. He lived in the United States 1815- 
1830 (1768-1854). 

65 Scapin is a comic rogue in Moliere’s Les Fourberies de Scapin. 
The Abbe de Pradt called Napoleon by this nickname. 

56 Emerson saw truly what the world at large is only beginning 
to see, that wars are not the bases for true peace. 

67 See page 125, note 48. 


vn 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 

T FIND a provision in the constitution of the world for the 
writer, or secretary, who is to report the doings of the 
miraculous spirit of life that everywhere throbs and works. 
His office is a reception of the facts into the mind, and then a 
selection of the eminent and characteristic experiences. 

Nature will be reported. All things are engaged in writing 
their history. The planet, the pebble, goes attended by its 
shadow. The rolling rock leaves its scratches on the moun¬ 
tain ; the river its channel in the soil; the animal its bones in 
the stratum; the fern and leaf their modest epitaph in the 
coal. The falling drop makes its sculpture in the sand or the 
stone. Not a foot steps into the snow or along the ground, 
but prints, in characters more or less lasting, a map of its 
march. Every act of the man inscribes itself in the memories 
of his fellows and in his own manners and face. The air is 
full of sounds; the sky, of tokens; the ground is all memo¬ 
randa and signatures, and every object covered over with 
hints which speak to the intelligent. 

In nature, this self-registration is incessant, and the narra¬ 
tive is the print of the seal. It neither exceeds nor comes short 
of the fact. But nature strives upward; and, in man, the 
report is something more than print of the seal. It is a new 
and finer form of the original. The record is alive, as that 
which is recorded is alive. In man, the memory is a kind of 
looking-glass, which, having received the images of surround¬ 
ing objects, is touched with life, and disposes them in a new 
order. The facts do not lie in it inert; but some subside and 

174 


175 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 

others shine; so that soon we have a new picture, composed of 
the eminent experiences. The man co-operates. He loves to 
communicate; and that which is for him to say lies as a load 
on his heart until it is delivered. But, besides the universal 
joy of conversation, some men are born with exalted powers 
for this second creation. Men are born to write. The gar¬ 
dener saves every slip and seed and peach-stone: his vocation 
is to be a planter of plants. Not less does the writer attend 
his affair. Whatever he beholds or experiences, comes to him 
as a model and sits for its picture. He counts it all nonsense 
that they say that some things are undescribable. He be¬ 
lieves that all that can be thought can be written, first or last; 
and he would report the Holy Ghost, or attempt it. Nothing 
so broad, so subtle, or so dear, but comes therefore com¬ 
mended to his pen, and he will write. In his eyes, a man is the 
faculty of reporting, and the universe is the possibility of 
being reported. In conversation, in calamity, he finds new 
materials; as our German poet said, “some god gave me the 
power to paint what I suffer.” 1 He draws his rents from 
rage and pain. By acting rashly, he buys the power of talking 
wisely. Vexations, and a tempest of passion, only fill his sails; 
as the good Luther 2 writes, “When I am angry, I can pray 
well, and preach well”: and, if we knew the genesis of fine 
strokes of eloquence, they might recall the complaisance of 
Sultan Amurath, 3 who struck off some Persian heads, that 
his physician, Vesalius, 4 might see the spasms in the muscles 
of the neck. His failures are the preparation of his victories, j 
A new thought or a crisis of passion apprises him that all 
that he has yet learned and written is exoteric, — is not the 
fact, but some rumor of the fact. What then? Does he throw 
away the pen? No; he begins again to describe in the new 
light which has shined on him, — if, by some means, he may 
yet save some true word. Nature conspires. Whatever can 
be thought can be spoken, and still rises for utterance, though 
to rude and stammering organs. If they cannot compass it, it 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


176 

waits and works, until at last it moulds them to its perfect will, 
and is articulated. 

This striving after imitative expression, which one meets 
everywhere, is significant of the aim of nature, but is mere 
stenography. There are higher degrees, and nature has more 
splendid endowments for those whom she elects to a superior 
office; for the class of scholars or writers, who see connection 
where the multitude see fragments, and who are impelled to 
exhibit the facts in order, and so to supply the axis on which 
the frame of things turns. Nature has dearly at heart the 
formation of the speculative man, or scholar. It is an end 
never lost sight of, and is prepared in the original casting of 
things. He is no permissive or accidental appearance, but an 
organic agent, one of the estates of the realm, provided and 
prepared from of old and from everlasting, in the knitting and 
contexture of things. Presentiments, impulses, cheer him. 
There is a certain heat in the breast which attends the per¬ 
ception of a primary truth, which is the shining of the spiritual 
sun down into the shaft of the mine. Every thought which 
dawns on the mind, in the moment of its emergency an¬ 
nounces its own rank, — whether it is some whimsy, or 
whether it is a power. 

If he have his incitements, there is, on the other side, invi¬ 
tation and need enough of his gift. Society has, at all times, 
the same want, namely of one sane man with adequate powers 
of expression to hold up each object of monomania in its right 
relations. The ambitious and mercenary bring their last new 
mumbo-jumbo, 5 whether tariff, Texas, railroad, Romanism, 
mesmerism, 6 or California; and, by detaching the object from 
its relations, easily succeed in making it seen in a glare; and a 
multitude go mad about it, and they are not to be reproved 
or cured by the opposite multitude who are kept from this 
particular insanity by an equal frenzy on another crochet. 
But let one man have the comprehensive eye that can replace 
this isolated prodigy in its right neighborhood and bearings, — 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 177 

the illusion vanishes, and the returning reason of the com¬ 
munity thanks the reason of the monitor. 

The scholar is the man of the ages, but he must also wish 
with other men to stand well with his contemporaries. But 
there is a certain ridicule, among superficial people, thrown on 
the scholars or clerisy, which is of no import unless the scholar 
heed it. In this country, the emphasis of conversation and of 
public opinion commends the practical man; and the solid 
portion of the community is named with significant respect in 
every circle. Our people are of Bonaparte’s opinion concern¬ 
ing ideologists. Ideas are subversive of social order and com¬ 
fort, and at last make a fool of the possessor. It is believed 
the ordering a cargo of goods from New York to Smyrna, 
or the running up and down to procure a company of sub¬ 
scribers to set a-going five or ten thousand spindles, or the 
negotiations of a caucus and the practising on the prejudices 
and facility of country-people to secure their votes in Novem¬ 
ber, — is practical and commendable. 

If I were to compare action of a much higher strain with a 
life of contemplation, I should not venture to pronounce with 
much confidence in favor of the former. Mankind have such 
a deep stake in inward illumination, that there is much to 
be said by the hermit or monk in defence of his life of 
thought and prayer. A certain partiality, a headiness and 
loss of balance, is the tax which all action must pay. Act, if 
you like, — but you do it at your peril. Men’s actions are too 
strong for them. Show me a man who has acted and who has 
not been the victim and slave of his action. What they have 
done commits and enforces them to do the same again. The 
first act, which was to be an experiment, becomes a sacrament. 
The fiery reformer embodies his aspiration in some rite or 
covenant, and he and his friends cleave to the form and lose 
the aspiration. The Quaker has established Quakerism, the 
Shaker 7 has established his monastery and his dance; and 
although each prates of spirit, there is no spirit, but repeti- 


178 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


tion, which is anti-spiritual. But where are his new things of 
to-day? In actions of enthusiasm 8 this drawback appears, 
but in those lower activities, which have no higher aim than 
to make us more comfortable and more cowardly; in actions 
of cunning, actions that steal and lie, actions that divorce the 
speculative from the practical faculty and put a ban on reason 
and sentiment, there is nothing else but drawback and ne¬ 
gation. The Hindoos write in their sacred books, “Children 
only, and not the learned, speak of the speculative and the 
practical faculties as two. They are but one, for both obtain 
the selfsame end, and the place which is gained by the fol¬ 
lowers of the one is gained by the followers of the other. 
That man seeth, who seeth that the speculative and the prac¬ 
tical doctrines are one.” For great action must draw on the 
spiritual nature. The measure of action is the sentiment from 
which it proceeds. The greatest action may easily be one of 
the most private circumstances. 

This disparagement will not come from the leaders, but 
from inferior persons. The robust gentlemen who stand at 
the head of the practical class share the ideas of the time, and 
have too much sympathy with the speculative class. It is not 
from men excellent in any kind that disparagement of any 
other is to be looked for. With such, Talleyrand’s 9 question 
is ever the main one; not, is he rich? is he committed? is he 
well-meaning? has he this or that faculty? is he of the move¬ 
ment? is he of the establishment? — but, Is he anybody? does 
he stand for something? He must be good of his kind. That 
is all that Talleyrand, all that State-street, 10 all that the com¬ 
mon sense of mankind asks. Be real and admirable, not as we 
know, but as you know. Able men do not care in what kind 
a man is able, so only that he is able. A master likes a master, 
and does not stipulate whether it be orator, artist, craftsman, 
or king. 

Society has really no graver interest than the well-being of 
the literary class. And it is not to be denied that men are 


179 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 

cordial in their recognition and welcome of intellectual accom¬ 
plishments. Still the writer does not stand with us on any 
commanding ground. I think this to be his own fault. A 
pound passes for a pound. There have been times when he 
was a sacred person: he wrote Bibles, 11 the first hymns, the 
codes, the epics, tragic songs, Sibylline 12 verses, Chaldean 13 
oracles, Laconian 14 sentences, inscribed on temple walls. 
Every word was true, and woke the nations to new life. He 
wrote without levity and without choice. Every word was 
carved before his eyes into the earth and sky; and the sun and 
stars were only letters of the same purport and of no more 
necessity. But how can he be honored when he does not 
honor himself; when he loses himself in the crowd; when he 
is no longer the lawgiver, but the sycophant, ducking to the 
giddy opinion of a reckless public; when he must sustain with 
shameless advocacy some bad government, or must bark, all 
the year round, in opposition; or write conventional criticism, 
or profligate novels; or at any rate write without thought, and 
without recurrence by day and by night to the sources of 
inspiration? 

Some reply to these questions may be furnished by looking 
over the list of men of literary genius in our age. Among these, 
no more instructive name occurs than that of Goethe to 
represent the power and duties of the scholar or writer. 

I described Bonaparte as a representative on the popular 
external life and aims of the nineteenth century. Its other 
half, its poet, is Goethe, a man quite domesticated in the cen¬ 
tury, breathing its air, enjoying its fruits, impossible at any 
earlier time, and taking away, by his colossal parts, the re¬ 
proach of weakness which but for him would lie on the in¬ 
tellectual works of the period. He appears at a time when a 
general culture has spread itself and has smoothed' down 
all sharp individual traits; when, in the absence of heroic 
characters, a social comfort and co-operation have come in. 
There is no poet, but scores of poetic writers; no Columbus, 


l8o 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


but hundreds of post-captains, with transit-telescope, barom¬ 
eter, and concentrated soup and pemmican; 15 no Demos¬ 
thenes, 16 no Chatham, 17 but any number of clever parliamen¬ 
tary and forensic debaters; no prophet or saint, but colleges 
of divinity; no learned man, but learned societies, a cheap 
press, reading-rooms, and book-clubs without number. 
There was never such a miscellany of facts. The world ex¬ 
tends itself like American trade. We conceive Greek or 
Roman life, life in the middle ages, to be a simple and com¬ 
prehensible affair; but modern life to respect a multitude of 
things, which is distracting. 

Goethe was the philosopher of this multiplicity; hundred¬ 
handed, Argus-eyed, 18 able and happy to cope with this rolling 
miscellany of facts and sciences, and by his own versatility 
to dispose of them with ease; a manly mind, unembarrassed 
by the variety of coats of convention with which life had got 
encrusted, easily able by his subtlety to pierce these and 
to draw his strength from nature, with which he lived in full 
communion. What is strange too, he lived in a small town, 
in a petty state, in a defeated state, and in a time when Ger¬ 
many played no such leading part in the world’s affairs as to 
swell the bosom of her sons with any metropolitan pride, such 
as might have cheered a French, or English, or once, a Roman 
or Attic genius. Yet there is no trace of provincial limitation 
in his muse. He is not a debtor to his position, but was born 
with a free and controlling genius. 

The Helena, or the second part of Faust, 19 is a philosophy 
of literature set in poetry; the work of one who found himself 
the master of histories, mythologies, philosophies, sciences, 
and national literatures, in the encyclopaedical manner in 
which modern erudition, with its international intercourse of 
the whole earth’s population, researches into Indian, Etrus¬ 
can, 20 and all Cyclopaean 21 arts; geology, chemistry, astron¬ 
omy; and every one of these kingdoms assuming a certain 
aerial and poetic character, by reason of the multitude. One 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 181 

looks at a king with reverence; but if one should chance to be 
at a congress of kings, the eye would take liberties with the 
peculiarities of each. These are not wild miraculous songs, 
but elaborate forms to which the poet has confided the results 
of eighty years of observation. This reflective and critical 
wisdom makes the poem more truly the flower of this time. It 
dates itself. Still he is a poet, — poet of a prouder laurel than 
any contemporary, and, under this plague of microscopes 
(for he seems to see out of every pore of his skin), strikes the 
harp with a hero’s strength and grace. 

The wonder of the book is its superior intelligence. In the 
menstruum 22 of this man’s wit, the past and the present ages, 
and their religions, politics, and modes of thinking, are dis¬ 
solved into archetypes and ideas. What new mythologies sail 
through his head! The Greeks said that Alexander went as 
far as Chaos; Goethe went, only the other day, as far; and 
one step farther he hazarded, and brought himself safe back. 

There is a heart-cheering freedom in his speculation. The 
immense horizon which journeys with us lends its majesty to 
trifles and to matters of convenience and necessity, as to 
solemn and festal performances. He was the soul of his 
century. If that was learned, and had become, by population, 
compact organization, and drill of parts, one great Exploring 
Expedition, accumulating a glut of facts and fruits too fast 
for any hitherto-existing savants to classify, — this man’s 
mind had ample chambers for the distribution of all. He had 
a power to unite the detached atoms again by their own law. 
He has clothed our modern existence with poetry. Amid lit¬ 
tleness and detail, he detected the Genius of life, the old 
cunning Proteus, nestling close beside us, and showed that the 
dulness and prose we ascribe to the age was only another of his 
masks: — 


“His very flight is presence in disguise:” 

— that he had put off a gay uniform for a fatigue dress, and 


182 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


was not a whit less vivacious or rich in Liverpool or the 
Hague than once in Rome or Antioch. He sought him in 
public squares and main streets, in boulevards and hotels; 
and, in the solidest kingdom of routine and the senses, he 
showed the lurking daemonic power; that, in actions of rou¬ 
tine, a thread of mythology and fable spins itself: and this, 
by tracing the pedigree of every usage and practice, every 
institution, utensil, and means, home to its origin in the 
structure of man. He had an extreme impatience of conjecture 
and of rhetoric. “ I have guesses enough of my own; if a man 
write a book, let him set down only what he knows.” He 
writes in the plainest and lowest tone, omitting a great deal 
more than he writes, and putting ever a thing for a word. He 
has explained the distinction between the antique and the 
modern spirit and art. He has defined art, its scope and laws. 
He has said the best things about nature that ever were said. 
He treats nature as the old philosophers, as the seven wise 
masters 23 did, — and, with whatever loss of French tabulation 
and dissection, poetry and humanity remain to us; and they 
have some doctoral skill. Eyes are better on the whole than 
telescopes or microscopes. He has contributed a key to many 
parts of nature, through the rare turn for unity and simplicity 
in his mind. Thus Goethe suggested the leading idea of 
modern botany, that a leaf or the eye of a leaf is the unit of 
botany, and that every part of the plant is only a transformed 
leaf to meet a new condition; and, by varying the conditions, 
a leaf may be converted into any other organ, and any other 
organ into a leaf. In like manner, in osteology, he assumed 
that one vertebra of the spine might be considered the unit 
of the skeleton: the head was only the uppermost vertebrae 
transformed. “ The plant goes from knot to knot, closing, at 
last, with the flower and the seed. So the tape-worm, the 
caterpillar, goes from knot to knot and closes with the head. 
Men and the higher animals are built up through the verte¬ 
brae, the powers being concentrated in the head.” In optics 


GGETHE; OR, THE WRITER 183 

again he rejected the artificial theory of seven colors, and con¬ 
sidered that every color was the mixture of light and darkness 
in new proportions. It is really of very little consequence what 
topic he writes upon. He sees at every pore, and has a certain 
gravitation towards truth. He will realize what you say. He 
hates to be trifled with and to be made to say over again some 
old wife’s fable that has had possession of men’s faith these 
thousand years. He may as well see if it is true as another. 
He sifts it. I am here, he would say, to be the measure and 
judge of these things. Why should I take them on trust? 
And therefore what he says of religion, of passion, of mar¬ 
riage, of manners, property, of paper money, of periods of 
beliefs, of omens, of luck, or whatever else, refuses to be 
forgotten. 

Take the most remarkable example that could occur of this 
tendency to verify every term in popular use. The Devil had 
played an important part in mythology in all times. Goethe 
would have no word that does not cover a thing. The same 
measure will still serve: “I have never heard of any crime 
which I might not have committed.” So he flies at the throat 
of this imp. He shall be real; he shall be modern; he shall be 
European; he shall dress like a gentleman and accept the 
manners, and walk in the streets, and be well initiated in the 
life of Vienna and of Heidelberg in 1820, —or he shall not 
exist. Accordingly, he stripped him of mythologic gear, of 
horns, cloven foot, harpoon tail, brimstone and blue-fire, and, 
instead of looking in books and pictures, looked for him in 
his own mind, in every shade of coldness, selfishness, and un¬ 
belief that, in crowds, or in solitude, darkens over the human 
thought, — and found that the portrait gained reality and 
terror by everything he added and by everything he took 
away. He found that the essence of this hobgoblin which had 
hovered in shadow about the habitations of men ever since 
they were men, was pure intellect, applied, — as always there 
is a tendency, —to the service of the senses: and he flung 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


184 

into literature, in his Mephistopheles, 24 the first organic figure 
that has been added for some ages, and which will remain as 
long as the Prometheus. 25 

I have no design to enter into any analysis of his numerous 
works. They consist of translations, criticism, dramas, lyric, 
and every other description of poems, literary journals, and 
portraits of distinguished men. Yet I cannot omit to specify 
the “Wilhelm Meister.” 

“Wilhelm Meister” is a novel in every sense, the first of its 
kind, called by its admirers the only delineation of modern 
society, — as if other novels, those of Scott for example, dealt 
with costume and condition, this with the spirit of life. It is 
a book over which some veil is still drawn. It is read by 
very intelligent persons with wonder and delight. It is pre¬ 
ferred by some such to Hamlet, as a work of genius. I suppose 
no book of this century can compare with it in its delicious 
sweetness, so new, so provoking to the mind, gratifying it 
with so many and so solid thoughts, just insights into life and 
manners and characters; so many good hints for the conduct 
of life, so many unexpected glimpses into a higher sphere, and 
never a trace of rhetoric or dulness. A very provoking book to 
the curiosity of young men of genius, but a very unsatisfactory 
one. Lovers of light reading, those who look in it for the en¬ 
tertainment they find in a romance, are disappointed. On the 
other hand, those who begin it with the higher hope to read in 
it a worthy history of genius, and the just award of the laurel 
to its toils and denials, have also reason to complain. We had 
an English romance here, not long ago, professing to embody 
the hope of a new age and to unfold the political hope of the 
party called “Young England,” —in which the only reward 
of virtue is a seat in parliament, and a peerage. Goethe’s ro¬ 
mance has a conclusion as lame and immoral. George Sand, 26 
in Consuelo and its continuation, has sketched a truer and 
more dignified picture. In the progress of the story, the char¬ 
acters of the hero and heroine expand at a rate that shivers 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 185 

the porcelain chess-table of aristocratic convention: they 
quit the society and habits of their rank, they lose their wealth, 
they become the servants of great ideas and of the most 
generous social ends; until at last the hero, who is the centre 
and fountain of an association for the rendering of the noblest 
benefits to the human race, no longer answers to his own 
titled name: it sounds foreign and remote in his ear. — “I 
am only man,” he says; “I breathe and work for man”; 
and this in poverty and extreme sacrifices. Goethe’s hero, on 
the contrary, has so many weaknesses and impurities and 
keeps such bad company, that the sober English public, 
when the book was translated, were disgusted. And yet it is 
so crammed with wisdom, with knowledge of the world and 
with knowledge of laws; the persons so truly and subtly 
drawn, and with such few strokes, and not a word too much, — 
the book remains ever so new and unexhausted, that we must 
even let it go its way and be willing to get what good from it we 
can, assured that it has only begun its office, and has millions 
of readers yet to serve. 

The argument is the passage of a democrat to the aris¬ 
tocracy, using both words in their best sense. And this 
passage is not made in any mean or creeping way, but through 
the hall door. Nature and character assist, and the rank is 
made real by sense and probity in the nobles. No generous 
youth can escape this charm of reality in the book, so that it 
is highly stimulating to intellect and courage. 

The ardent and holy Novalis 27 characterized the book as 
“thoroughly modern and prosaic; the romantic is completely 
levelled in it; so is the poetry of nature; the wonderful. The 
book treats only of the ordinary affairs of men: it is a poeti¬ 
cized civic and domestic story. The wonderful in it is ex¬ 
pressly treated as fiction and enthusiastic dreaming”: — and 
yet, what is also characteristic, Novalis soon returned to this 
book, and it remained his favorite reading to the end of his 
life. 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


186 

What distinguishes Goethe for French and English readers’ 
is a property which he shares with his nation, — a habitual 
reference to interior truth. In England and in America there 
is a respect for talent; and, if it is exerted in support of any 
ascertained or intelligible interest or party, or in regular 
opposition to any, the public is satisfied. In France there is 
even a greater delight in intellectual brilliancy for its own sake. 
And in all these countries, men of talent write from talent. It 
is enough if the understanding is occupied, the taste propiti¬ 
ated, — so many columns, so many hours, filled in a lively and 
creditable way. The German intellect wants the French 
sprightliness, the fine practical understanding of the English, 
and the American adventure; but it has a certain probity, 
which never rests in a superficial performance, but asks 
steadily, To what end? A German public asks for a controlling 
sincerity. Here is activity of thought; but what is it for? 
What does the man mean? Whence, whence all these 
thoughts? 

Talent alone cannot make a writer. There must be a man 
behind the book; a personality which by birth and quality 
is pledged to the doctrines there set forth, and which exists to 
see and state things so, and not otherwise; holding things 
because they are things. If he cannot rightly express himself 
to-day, the same things subsist and will open themselves 
to-morrow. There lies the burden on his mind, — the burden 
of truth to be declared, —more or less understood; and it 
constitutes his business and calling in the world to see those 
facts through, and to make them known. What signifies that 
he trips and stammers; that his voice is harsh or hissing; that 
his method or his tropes are inadequate? That message will 
find method and imagery, articulation and melody. Though 
he were dumb it would speak. If not, — if there be no such 
God’s word in the man, — what care we how adroit, how 
fluent, how brilliant he is? 

It makes a great difference to the force of any sentence 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 


187 


whether there be a man behind it or no. In the learned 
journal, in the influential newspaper, I discern no form; only 
some irresponsible shadow; oftener some monied corporation, 
or some dangler who hopes, in the mask and robes of his 
paragraph, to pass for somebody. But through every clause 
and part of speech of a right book I meet the eyes of the most 
determined of men; his force and terror inundate every word; 
the commas and dashes are alive; so that the writing is 
athletic and nimble, — can go far and live long. 

In England and America, one may be an adept in the 
writings of a Greek or Latin poet, without any poetic taste or 
fire. That a man has spent years on Plato and Proclus, 28 does 
not afford a presumption that he holds heroic opinions, or 
undervalues the fashions of his town. But the German nation 
must have the most ridiculous good faith on these subjects: 
the student, out of the lecture-room, still broods on the les¬ 
sons ; and the professor cannot divest himself of the fancy that 
the truths of philosophy have some application to Berlin and 
Munich. This earnestness enables them to out-see men of 
much more talent. Hence, almost all the valuable distinc¬ 
tions which are current in higher conversation have been 
derived to us from Germany. But whilst men distinguished 
for wit and learning, in England and France, adopt their 
study and their side with a certain levity, and are not under¬ 
stood to be very deeply engaged, from grounds of character, 
to the topic or the part they espouse, — Goethe, the head and 
body of the German nation, does not speak from talent, but 
the truth shines through: he is very wise, though his talent 
often veils his wisdom. However excellent his sentence is, he 
has somewhat better in view. It awakens my curiosity. He 
has the formidable independence which converse with truth 
gives: hear you, or forbear, his fact abides; and your interest 
in the writer is not confined to his story and he dismissed from 
memory when he has performed his task creditably, as a 
baker when he has left his loaf; but his work is the least part 


i 88 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


of him. The old Eternal Genius who built the world has 
confided himself more to this man than to any other. 

I dare not say that Goethe ascended to the highest grounds 
from which genius has spoken. He has not worshipped the 
highest unity; he is incapable of a self-surrender to the moral 
sentiment. There are nobler strains in poetry than any he 
has sounded. There are writers poorer in talent, whose tone 
is purer and more touches the heart. Goethe can never be 
dear to men. His is not even the devotion to pure truth; 
but to truth for the sake of culture. He has no aims less large 
than the conquest of universal nature, of universal truth, to 
be his portion: a man not to be bribed, nor deceived, nor 
overawed; of a stoical self-command and self-denial, and 
having one test for all men, — What can you teach me? All 
possessions are valued by him for that only; rank, privileges, 
health, time, Being itself. 

He is the type of culture, the amateur of all arts, and 
sciences, and events; artistic, but not artist; spiritual, but 
not spiritualist. There is nothing he had not right to know: 
there is no weapon in the army of universal genius he did not 
take into his hand, but with peremptory heed that he should 
not be for a moment prejudiced by his instruments. He lays 
a ray of light under every fact, and between himself and his 
dearest property. From him nothing was hid, nothing with- 
holden. The lurking daemons sat to him, and the saint who 
saw the daemons; and the metaphysical elements took form. 
“Piety itself is no aim, but only a means whereby through 
purest inward peace, we may attain to highest culture.” And 
his penetration of every secret of the fine arts will make Goethe 
still more statuesque. His affections help him, like women 
employed by Cicero 29 to worm out the secret of conspira¬ 
tors. Enmities he has none. Enemy of him you may be, — if 
so you shall teach him aught which your good-will cannot, 
were it only what experience will accrue from your ruin. 
Enemy and welcome, but enemy on high terms, He cannot 


GOETHE; OR, THE WRITER 189 

hate anybody; his time is worth too much. Temperamental 
antagonisms may be suffered, but like feuds of emperors, who 
fight dignifiedly across kingdoms. 

His autobiography, under the title of “Poetry and Truth 
Out of My Life,” is the expression of the idea, — now familiar 
to the world through the German mind, but a novelty to 
England, Old and New, when that book appeared, — that a 
man exists for culture; not for what he can accomplish, but 
for what can be accomplished in him. The reaction of things 
on the man is the only noteworthy result. An intellectual 
man can see himself as a third person; therefore his faults 
and delusions interest him equally with his successes. Though 
he wishes to prosper in affairs, he wishes more to know the 
history and destiny of man; whilst the clouds of egotists 
drifting about him are only interested in a low success. 

This idea reigns in the “Dichtung und Wahrheit,” 30 and 
directs the selection of the incidents; and nowise the external 
importance of events, the rank of the personages, or the 
bulk of incomes. Of course the book affords slender materials 
for what would be reckoned with us a “Life of Goethe”; — 
few dates, no correspondence, no details of offices or employ¬ 
ments, no light on his marriage; and, a period of ten years, 
that should be the most active in his life, after his settlement 
at Weimar, 31 is sunk in silence. Meantime certain love affairs, 
that came to nothing, as people say, have the strangest im¬ 
portance : he crowds us with detail: — certain whimsical 
opinions, cosmogonies, and religions of his own invention, and 
especially his relations to remarkable minds and to critical 
epochs of thought: — these he magnifies. His “Daily and 
Yearly Journal,” his “Italian Travels,” his “Campaign in 
France,” and the historical part of his “Theory of Colors,” 
have the same interest. In the last, he rapidly notices Kep¬ 
ler, 32 Roger Bacon, 33 Galileo, 34 Newton, 35 Voltaire, 38 etc.; 
and the charm of this portion of the book consists in the 
simplest statement of the relation betwixt these grandees of 


190 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


European scientific history and himself; the mere drawing 
of the lines from Goethe to Kepler, from Goethe to Bacon, 
from Goethe to Newton. The drawing of the line is for the 
time and person, a solution of the formidable problem, and 
gives pleasure when Iphigenia 37 and Faust do not, without 
any cost of invention comparable to that of Iphigenia and 
Faust. 

This lawgiver of art is not an artist. Was it that he knew 
too much, that his sight was microscopic and interfered with 
the just perspective, the seeing of the whole? He is fragmen¬ 
tary ; a writer of occasional poems and of an encyclopaedia of 
sentences. When he sits down to write a drama or a tale, he 
collects and sorts his observations from a hundred sides, and 
combines them into the body as fitly as he can. A great deal 
refuses to incorporate: this he adds loosely as letters of the 
parties, leaves from their journals, or the like. A great deal 
still is left that will not find any place. This the bookbinder 
alone can give any cohesion to; and hence, notwithstanding 
the looseness of many of his works, we have volumes of de¬ 
tached paragraphs, aphorisms, Xenien 38 etc. 

I suppose the worldly tone of his tales grew out of the 
calculations of self-culture. It was the infirmity of an ad¬ 
mirable scholar, who loved the world out of gratitude; who 
knew where libraries, galleries, architecture, laboratories, 
savants, and leisure, were to be had, and who did not quite 
trust the compensations of poverty and nakedness. Socrates 
loved Athens; Montaigne, Paris; and Madame de Stael 39 
said she was only vulnerable on that side (namely, of Paris). 
It has its favorable aspect. All the geniuses are usually so ill- 
assorted and sickly that one is ever wishing them some¬ 
where else. We seldom see anybody who is not uneasy or 
afraid to live. There is a slight blush of shame on the cheek 
of good men and aspiring men, and a spice of caricature. But 
this man was entirely at home and happy in his century and 
the world. None was so fit to live, or more heartily enjoyed 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 191 

the game. In this aim of culture, which is the genius of his 
works, is their power. The idea of absolute, eternal truth, 
without reference to my own enlargement by it, is higher. 
The surrender to the torrent of poetic inspiration is higher; 
but compared with any motives on which books are written 
in England and America, this is very truth, and has the power 
to inspire which belongs to truth. Thus has he brought back 
to a book some of its ancient might and dignity. 

Goethe, coming into an over-civilized time and country, 
when original talent was oppressed under the load of books 
and mechanical auxiliaries and the distracting variety of 
claims, taught men how to dispose of this mountainous 
miscellany and make it subservient. I join Napoleon with 
him, as being both representatives of the impatience and 
reaction of nature against the morgue of conventions, — two 
stern realists, who, with their scholars, have severally set the 
axe at the root of the tree of cant and seeming, for this time 
and for all time. This cheerful laborer, with no external 
popularity or provocation, drawing his- motive and his plan 
from his own breast, tasked himself with stints for a giant, and 
without relaxation or rest, except by alternating his pursuits, 
worked on for eighty years with the steadiness of his first zeal. 

It is the last lesson of modern science that the highest 
simplicity of structure is produced, not by few elements, but 
by the highest complexity. Man is the most composite of all 
creatures; the wheel-insect, volvox globator , i0 is at the other 
extreme. We shall learn to draw rents and revenues from the N 
immense patrimony of the old and recent ages. Goethe 
teaches courage, and the equivalence of all times; that the 
disadvantages of any epoch exist only to the faint-hearted. 
Genius hovers with his sunshine and music close by the dark-" 
est and deafest eras. No mortgage, no attainder, will hold on 
men or hours. The world is young: the former great men call 
to us affectionately. We too must write Bibles, to unite 
again the heavens and the earthly world. The secret of genius 


192 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


is to suffer no fiction to exist for us; to realize all that we 
know; in the high refinement of modern life, in arts, in 
sciences, in books, in men, to exact good faith, reality, and a 
purpose; and first, last, midst, and without end, to honor 
every truth by use. 


NOTES 

1 From Goethe’s Tasso. The German version is: 

“Und wenn der Mensch in seiner Qual verstummt, 

Gab mir ein Gott zu sagen, was ich leide.” 

In 1822, forty years after the Tasso was written, these verses 
were used as a motto for Goethe’s poem, Die Marienbader Elegie 
(The Elegy of Marienbad). The editor is indebted to Dr. F. A. 
Wittmer, Washington and Jefferson College, for this reading. 

2 See page 23, note 51. 

3 There were Turkish Sultans by this name. Emerson prob¬ 
ably refers to the fourth, known as “the Turkish Nero,” because 
of his cruelty. 

4 Veselius, Andreas, Italian physician, forced to make a pil¬ 
grimage to the Holy Land as a penance by the Inquisition, be¬ 
cause he dared to question some of the conclusions of the great 
Galen. It was while he was thus paying the price of his heresy 
that the sultan performed this experiment for his benefit (1514- 
i 5 6 4 )- 

5 A name given to a practice among the Kaffirs of Africa by 
which a husband punishes a wife who is unruly by appearing at 
night in a fantastic disguise and scaring her into submission. 

6 The science of animal magnetism, used in the curing of 
diseases, a kind of hypnotism; named for its inventor, Friedrich 
Anton Mesmer (1733-1815). 

7 The Shakers were founded in America in 1774 by Anne Lee, 
though the term had previously been applied to a certain group 
of Quakers in England. They flourished until about 1830. Now 
they are almost extinct. They are communists, the sexes living 
in separate dormitories. The dance is the ecstatic ceremony 
which, no doubt, gave them their name. 

8 Here used in the philosophical sense of religious ecstasy or 
elevation of the soul. 

9 Talleyrand-Perigord, Charles Maurice de, brilliant French 
churchman and diplomatist, as well as writer (1754-1838). 

10 A famous street in Boston. 

11 That is, Emerson is implying the original sacredness of the 
writing art. 

12 A collection of oracles in Greek hexameters, first collected 


GCETHE; OR, THE WRITER 193 

on Mt. Ida in the time of Solon and later brought to Italy. Emer¬ 
son is referring, no doubt, to ancient classical poetry. 

13 An oracle was a prophecy given out at the seat of the worship 
of some divinity by priests, usually in answer to inquiry by 
votaries. 

14 Laconia was another name for Sparta. The phrase means 
consisting of a few words after the Laconian fashion;-cf. the ad¬ 
jective “laconic.” 

15 A food first prepared by American Indians and much used by 
explorers because of its compactness. It is prepared by pound¬ 
ing sun-cured strips of venison into fine particles and mixing 
them with melted fat; sometimes compressed into cakes. 

16 Athenian orator and patriot (384-322 B.C.). 

17 Celebrated English statesman, noted for his oratory in 
debate (1759-1806). 

18 From the Greek mythological Argos, who had a hundred 
eyes. Juno is supposed to have used him as a spy on Io, of whom 
she was jealous. Hence, the phrase means jealous. 

19 Faust was the great dramatic masterpiece of the German 
poet, Goethe. 

20 The Etruscans were the inhabitants of ancient Etruria, in 
Italy, which in later times was merged into Rome. Art relics 
consist of pottery, gems, bronze, sculptures, and paintings on the 
walls of tombs. 

21 See page 148, note 82. 

22 A menstruum here means a solvent; that is, a liquid which 
dissolves a solid body. Hence, the application to wit. 

23 See page 58, note 58. 

/ 24 Chief character of Goethe’s drama, Faust. 

25 Refers to the Prometheus Bound of ^Eschylus. 

26 George Sand , Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin, Madame 
Dudevant, French novelist. The Consuelo is considered her best 
work (1804-1876). 

27 Pseudonym of Frederich von Hardenberg, a German writer 
(1772-1801). 

28 Greek philosopher of the Neoplatonic school of thought 
(ca. 411-485). 

29 Cicero, Marcus Tullius, Roman advocate, orator, and writer 
(106-43 b.c.). 

30 Poetry and Truth. 

31 A literary center in Germany, sometimes called “the German 
Athens,” the capital of the grand duchy of Saxe-Weimar. 

32 Kepler, Johannes, German astronomer (1571-1630). 

33 A learned and beloved English monk and philosopher of the 
Franciscan order at Oxford {ca. 1214-1294). 

34 Galileo {Galilei), Italian mathematician who did much for 
founding our modern science (1564-1642). 

35 See page 56, note 15. 


194 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


36 See page 23, note 66. 

37 In the Greek myth this daughter of Agamemnon and 
Clytemnestra was offered by her father as a sacrifice to Artemis, 
who from anger against him for killing a hart in her sacred grove 
caused a calm which detained the Greek ships at Aulis on the 
expedition against Troy. Artemis substituted a stag for the 
maiden and carried her off to Taurus to become her priestess. 

38 A collection of distichs written in collaboration with Schiller 
as a retaliation on the critics. 

39 Madame de 5 toe 7 -Holstein, French author and social leader 
(1766-1817). 

40 A fresh water organism, composed of minute cells, occurring 
in spherical colonies about one-fiftieth of an inch in diameter. 


OTHER ESSAYS 


SELF-RELIANCE 

T READ the other day some verses written by an emiment 
A painter which were original and not conventional. The 
soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject 
be what it may. The sentiment they instil is of more value 
than any thought they may contain. To believe your own 
thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private 
heart is true for all men, — that is genius. Speak your latent 
conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost 
in due time becomes the outmost, and our first thought is 
rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment. 
Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highest merit 
we ascribe to Moses, Plato, and Milton is that they set at 
naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men, but 
what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch 
that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, 
more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. 
Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. 
In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected 
thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated 
majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lesson 
for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous 
impression with good-humored inflexibility then most when 
the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else to-morrow a 
stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we 
have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to 
take with shame our own opinion from another. 

There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at 
the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is sui- 

195 


196 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

cide; that he must take himself for better for worse as his 
portion; / that though the wide universe is full of good, no 
kernekol nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil 
bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. 
The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none 
but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know 
until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, 
one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. 
This sculpture in the memory is not without preestablished 
harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, 
that it might testify of that particular ray. We but half ex¬ 
press ourselves, and are ashamed of that divine idea which 
each of us represents. It may be safely trusted as propor¬ 
tionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but 
God will not have his work made manifest by cowards. A 
man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his 
work and done his best; but what he has said or done other¬ 
wise shall give him no peace. It is a deliverance which does 
not deliver. In the attempt his genius deserts him; no muse 
befriends; no invention, no hope. 

C Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.- 
Accept the place the divine providence has found for you, the 
society of your contemporaries, the connection of events. 
Great men have always done so, and confided themselves 
childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception 
that the absolutely trustworthy was seated at their heart, 
working through their hands, predominating in all their being. 
And we are now men, and must accept in the highest mind the 
same transcendent destiny; and not minors and invalids in 
a protected corner, not cowards fleeing before a revolution, 
but guides, redeemers, and benefactors, obeying the Almighty 
effort and advancing on Chaos and the Dark. 

What pretty oracles nature yields us on this text in the face 
and behavior of children, babes, and even brutes! That 
divided and rebel mind, that distrust of a sentiment because 


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our arithmetic has computed the strength and means opposed 
to our purpose, these have not. Their mind being whole, 
their eye is as yet unconquered, and when we look in their 
faces we are disconcerted. Infancy conforms to nobody; 
all conform to it; so that one babe commonly makes four or 
five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. So God has 
armed youth and puberty and manhood no less with its own 
piquancy and charm, and made it enviable and gracious and 
its claims not to be put by, if it will stand by itself. Do not 
think the youth has no force, because he cannot speak to you 
and me. Hark! in the next room who spoke so clear and em¬ 
phatic. It seems he knows how to speak to his contempo¬ 
raries. Bashful or bold then, he will know how to make us 
seniors very unnecessary. 

The nonchalance of boys who are sure of a dinner, and would 
disdain as much as a lord to do or say aught to conciliate one, 
is the healthy attitude of human nature. A boy is in the 
parlor what the pit is in the playhouse; independent, irre¬ 
sponsible, looking out from his corner on such people and facts 
as pass by, he tries and sentences them on their merits, in the 
swift, summary way of boys, as good, bad, interesting, silly, 
eloquent, troublesome. He cumbers himself never about 
consequences, about interests; he gives an independent, 
genuine verdict. You must court him; he does not court you. 
But the man is as it were clapped into jail by his conscious¬ 
ness. As soon as he has once acted or spoken with eclat he is a 
committed person, watched by the sympathy or the hatred of 
hundreds, whose affections must now enter into his account. 
There is no Lethe 2 for this. Ah, that he could pass again into 
his neutrality! Who can thus avoid all pledges and, having 
observed, observe again from the same unaffected, unbiased, 
unbribable, unaffrighted innocence, — must always be for¬ 
midable. He would utter opinions on all passing affairs, 
which being seen to be not private but necessary, would sink 
like darts into the ear of men and put them in fear. 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


198 

These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they 
grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society 
everywhere 3 is in conspiracy against the manhood of every 
one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in 
which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread 
to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the 
eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reli¬ 
ance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but 
names and customs. 

C^Whoso would be a man, must be a nonconformist.^)He who 
would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the 
name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Noth- 
thing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. 
Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of 
the world. I remember an answer which when quite young I 
was prompted to make to a valued adviser who was wont to 
importune me with the dear old doctrines of the church. On 
my saying, “What have I to do with the sacredness of tra¬ 
ditions, if I live wholly from within?” my friend suggested, — 
“But these impulses may be from below, not from above.” 
I replied, “They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am 

_the Devil’s child, I will live then from the Devil.” ()No law 

can be sacred to me but that of my nature. CGood and bad 
are but names very readily transferable to that or this; the 
only right is what is after my constitution; the only wrong 
what is against it.\ A man is to carry himself in the presence of 
all opposition as IT every thing were titular and ephemeral but 
he. I am ashamed to think how easily we capitulate to badges 
and names, to large societies and dead institutions. Every de¬ 
cent and well-spoken individual affects and sways me more 
than is right. I ought to go upright and vital, and speak the 
rude truth in all ways. If malice and vanity wear the coat of 
philanthropy, shall that pass? If an angry bigot assumes this 
bountiful cause of Abolition, and comes to me with his last 
news from Barbadoes , 4 why should I not say to him, “Go 


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love thy infant; love thy wood-chopper; be good-natured 
and modest; have that grace; and never varnish your hard, 
uncharitable ambition with this incredible tenderness for 
black folk a thousand miles off. Thy love afar is spite at 
home.” Rough and graceless would be such greeting, but 
truth is handsomer than the affection of love. Your goodness 
must have some edge to it, — else it is none. The doctrine of 
hatred must be preached, as the counteraction of the doctrine 
of love, when that pules and whines. I shun father and 
mother and wife and brother when my genius calls me. I 
would write on the lintels of the door-post, Whim. I hope it is 
somewhat better than whim at last, but we cannot spend the 
day in explanation. Expect me not to show cause why I seek 
or why I exclude company. Then, again, do not tell me, as a 
good man did to-day, of my obligation to put all poor men in 
good situations. Are they my poor? I tell thee, thou foolish 
philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent I 
give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not 
belong. There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual 
affinity I am bought and sold; for them I will go to prison if 
need be; but your miscellaneous popular charities; the educa¬ 
tion at college of fools; the building of meeting-houses to the 
vain end to which many now stand; alms to sots, and the 
thousand-fold Relief Societies; — though I confess with 
shame I sometimes succumb and give the dollar, it is a 
picked dollar, which by and by I shall have the manhood to 
withhold. 

Virtues are, in the popular estimate, rather the exception 
than the rule. There is the man and his virtues. Men do 
what is called a good action, as some piece of courage or 
charity, much as they would pay a fine in expiation of daily 
non-appearance on parade. Their works are done as an 
apology or extenuation of their living in the world, — as 
invalids and the insane pay a high board. Their virtues are 
penances. /I do not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is 


200 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


for itself and not for a spectacle.) I much prefer that it should 
be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it 
should be glittering and unsteady. I wish it to be sound and 
sweet, and not to need diet and bleeding. I ask primary 
evidence that you are a man, and refuse this appeal from the 
man to his actions. I know that for myself it makes no differ¬ 
ence whether I do or forbear those actions which are reckoned 
excellent. I cannot consent to pay for a privilege where I 
have intrinsic right. Few and mean as my gifts may be, I ac¬ 
tually am, and do not need for my own assurance or the assur¬ 
ance of my fellows any secondary testimony. 

( What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people 
think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual 
life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness 
and meanness. It is the harder because you will always find 
those who think they know what is your duty better than 
you know it. It is easy in the world to live after the world’s 
opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the 
great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with 
perfect sweetness the independence of solitude. 

The objection to conforming to usages that have become 
dead to you is that it scatters your force. It loses your time 
and blurs the impression of your character. If you maintain 
a dead church, contribute to a dead Bible Society, vote with a 
great party either for the Government or against it, spread 
your table like base housekeepers, — under all these screens 
I have difficulty to detect the precise man you are: and of 
course so much force is withdrawn from your proper life. 
But do your work, and I shall know you. Do your work, and 
you shall reinforce yourself. A man must consider what a 
blindman’s buff is this game of conformity. If I know your 
sect I anticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce 
for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions 
of his church. Do I not know beforehand that not possibly 
can he say a new and spontaneous word? Do I not know that 


SELF-RELIANCE 


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with all this ostentation of examining the grounds of the 
institution he will do no such thing? Do I not know that he 
is pledged to himself not to look but at one side, the permitted 
side, not as a man, but as a parish minister? He is a retained 
attorney, and these airs of the bench are the emptiest affec- 
, tation. Well, most men have bound their eyes with one or 
another handkerchief, and attached themselves to some one 
of these communities of opinion. This conformity makes 
them not false in a few particulars, authors of a few lies, but 
false in all particulars. Their every truth is not quite true. 

Their two is not the real two, their four not the real four; 
so that every word they say chagrins us and we know not 
where to begin to set them right. Meantime nature is not 
slow to equip us in the prison uniform of the party to which 
we adhere. We come to wear one cut of face and figure, and 
acquire by degrees the gentlest asinine expression. There is a 
mortifying experience in particular, which does not fail to 
wreak itself also in the general history; I mean “the foolish 
face of praise”, the forced smile which we put on in company 
where we do not feel at ease, in answer to conversation which 
does not interest us. The muscles, not spontaneously moved 
but moved by a low usurping wilfulness, grow tight about the 
outline of the face, with the most disagreeable sensation. 

For nonconformity the world whips you with its dis¬ 
pleasure. And therefore a man must know how to estimate a 
sour face. The by-standers look askance on him in the public 
street or in the friend’s parlor. If this aversation had its 
origin in contempt and resistance like his own he might well 
go home with a sad countenance; but the sour faces of the 
multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause, but are 
put on and off as the wind blows and a new paper directs. 
Yet is the discontent of the multitude more formidable than 
that of the senate and the college. It is easy enough for a firm 
man who knows the world to brook the rage of the cultivated 
classes. Their rage is decorous and prudent, for they are 


202 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


timid, as being very vulnerable themselves. But when to 
their feminine rage the indignation of the people is added, 
when the ignorant and the poor are aroused, when the unin¬ 
telligent brute force that lies at the bottom of society is made 
to growl and mow, it needs the habit of magnanimity and 
religion to treat it godlike as a trifle of no concernment. 

The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our con¬ 
sistency; a reverence for our past act or word because the 
eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit 
than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them. 

But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? 
Why drag about this corpse of your memory, lest you con¬ 
tradict somewhat you have stated in this or that public place? 
Suppose you should contradict yourself; what then? It 
seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory 
alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the 
past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live 
ever in a new day. In your metaphysics you have denied 
personality to the Deity, yet when the devout motions of the 
soul come, yield to them heart and life, though they should 
clothe God with shape and color. Leave your theory, as 
Joseph his coat in the hands of the harlots , 5 and flee, 
f A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored 
by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With con¬ 
sistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. }He may as 
well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. /Speak what 
you think now in hard words and to-morrow speak what 
to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict 
every thing you said to-day. — “Ah, then, so you shall be 
sure to be misunderstood.” Is it so bad then to be misunder¬ 
stood? Pythagoras 6 was misunderstood, and Socrates, and 
Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, 
and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be 
great is to be misunderstood. 

I suppose no man can violate his nature. All the sallies of 


SELF-RELIANCE 


203 


his will are rounded in by the law of his being, as the in¬ 
equalities of Andes and Himmaleh 7 are insignificant in the 
curve of the sphere. Nor does it matter how you gauge and 
try him. A character is like an acrostic or Alexandrian 
stanza ; 8 — read it forward, backward, or across, it still spells 
the same thing. In this pleasing contrite wood-life which 
God allows me, let me record day by day my honest thought 
without prospect or retrospect, and, I cannot doubt, it will 
be found symmetrical, though I mean it not and see it not. 
My book should smell of pines and resound with the hum of 
insects. The swallow over my window should interweave that 
thread or straw he carries in his bill into my web also. We pass 
for what we are. Character teaches above our wills. Men 
imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by 
overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath 
every moment. 

There will be an agreement in whatever variety of actions, 
so they be each honest and natural in their hour. For of one 
will, the actions will be harmonious, however unlike they seem. 
These varieties are lost sight of at a little distance, at a little 
height of thought. One tendency unites them all. The 
voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks. 
See the line from a sufficient distance, and it straightens 
itself to the average tendency. Your genuine action will 
explain itself and will explain your other genuine actions. 
Your conformity explains nothing. Act singly, and what 
you have.already done singly will justify you now. Greatness 
appeals to the future. If I can be firm enough to-day to do 
right and scorn eyes, I must have done so much right before 
as to defend me now. Be it how it will, do right now. Always 
scorn appearances and you always may. The force of char¬ 
acter is cumulative. All the foregone days of virtue work their 
health into this. What makes the majesty of the heroes of 
the senate and the field, which so fills the imagination? The 
consciousness of a train of great days and victories behind. 


204 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


They shed an united light on the advancing actor. He is 
attended as by a visible escort of angels. That is it which 
throws thunder in Chatham’s voice, and dignity into Wash- 
inton’s port, and America into Adams’s eye. Honor is vener¬ 
able to us because it is no ephemera . 9 It is always ancient 
virtue. We worship it to-day because it is not of to-day. We 
love it and pay it homage because it is not a trap for our 
love and homage, but is self-dependent, self-derived, and 
therefore of an old immaculate pedigree, even if shown in a 
young person. 

I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity 
and consistency. Let the words be gazetted and ridiculous 
henceforward. Instead of the gong for dinner, let us hear a 
whistle from the Spartan fife . 10 Let us never bow and apolo¬ 
gize more. A great man is coming to eat at my house. I do 
not wish to please him; I wish that he should wish to please 
me. I will stand here for humanity, and though I would 
make it kind, I would make it true. Let us affront and repri¬ 
mand the smooth mediocrity and squalid contentment of the 
times; and hurl in the face of custom and trade and office, 
the fact which is the upshot of all history, that there is a 
great responsible Thinker and Actor moving wherever a 
man works; that a true man belongs to no other time or 
place, but is the centre of things. Where he is, there is nature. 
He measures you and all men and all events. Ordinarily, 
every body in society reminds us of somewhat else, or of 
some other person. Character, reality, reminds you of noth- 
thing else; it takes place of the whole creation. The man must 
be so much that he must make all circumstances indifferent. 
Every true man is a cause, a country, and an age; requires in¬ 
finite spaces and numbers and time fully to accomplish his 
design;—and posterity seem to follow his steps as a pro¬ 
cession. A man Caesar is born, and for ages after we have a 
Roman Empire. Christ is born, and millions of minds so grow 
and cleave to his genius that he is confounded with virtue and 


SELF-RELIANCE 


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the possible of man. An institution is the lengthened shadow 
of one man; as, Monachism , 11 of the Hermit Antony; the 
Reformation , 12 of Luther; Quakerism , 13 of Fox; Methodism , 14 
of Wesley; Abolition , 16 of Clarkson. Scipio , 16 Milton called 
“the height of Rome”; and all history resolves itself very 
easily into the biography of a few stout and earnest persons. 
Q_Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under his 
feet. Let him not peep or steal, or skulk up and down with the 
air of a charity-boy, a bastard, or an interloper in the world 
which exists for him.^But the man in the street, finding no 
worth in himself whion corresponds to the force which built 
a tower or sculptured a marble god, feels poor when he looks 
on these. To him a palace, a statue, or a costly book have an 
alien and forbidding air, much like a gay equipage, and seem 
to say like that, “Who are you, sir?” Yet they all are his, 
suitors for his notice, petitioners to his faculties that they 
will come out and take possession. The picture waits for my 
verdict; it is not to command me, but I am to settle its 
claims to praise. That popular fable of the sot 17 who was 
picked up dead-drunk in the street, carried to the duke’s 
house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke’s bed, and, on 
his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like the 
duke, and assured that he had been insane, owes its popu¬ 
larity to the fact that it symbolizes so well the state of man, 
who is in the world a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, 
exercises his reason and finds himself a true prince. 

Our reading is mendicant and sycophantic. In history our 
imagination plays us false. Kingdom and lordship, power 
and estate, are a gaudier vocabulary than private John and 
Edward in a small house and common day’s work; but the 
things of life are the same to both; the sum total of both is the 
same. Why all this deference to Alfred 18 and Scanderbeg 19 
and Gustavus ? 20 Suppose they were virtuous; did they 
wear out virtue? As great a stake depends on your private 
act to-day as followed their public and renowned steps. When 


206 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


private men shall act with original views, the lustre will be 
transferred from the actions of kings to those of gentlemen. 

The world has indeed been instructed by its kings, who 
have so magnetized the eyes of nations. It has been taught by 
this colossal symbol the mutual reverence that is due from 
man to man. The joyful loyalty with which men have every¬ 
where suffered the king, the noble, or the great proprietor 
to walk among them by a law of his own, make his own scale 
of men and things and reverse theirs, pay for benefits not 
with money but with honor, and represent the law in his 
person, was the hieroglyphic by which they obscurely signified 
their consciousness of their own right and comeliness, the 
right of every man. 

The magnetism which all original action exerts is explained 
when we inquire the reason of self-trust. Who is the Trustee? 
What is the aboriginal Self, on which a universal reliance may 
be grounded? What is the nature and power of that science- 
baffling star, without parallax , 21 without calculable elements, 
which shoots a ray of beauty even into trivial and impure 
actions, if the least mark of independence appear? The in¬ 
quiry leads us to that source, at once the essence of genius, of 
virtue, and of life, which we call Spontaneity or Instinct. 
We denote this primary wisdom as Intuition, whilst all later 
teachings are tuitions. In that deep force, the last face be¬ 
hind which analysis cannot go, all things find their com¬ 
mon origin. For the sense of being which in calm hours 
rises, we know not how, in the soul, is not diverse from things, 
from space, from light, from time, from man, but one with 
them and proceeds obviously from the same source whence 
their life and being also proceed. We first share the life by 
which things exist and afterwards see them as appearances in 
nature and forget that we have shared their cause. Here is 
the fountain of action and of thought. Here are the lungs of 
that inspiration which giveth man wisdom, and which cannot 
be denied without impiety and atheism. We lie in the lap 


SELF-RELIANCE 


207 

of immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth 
and organs of its activity. When we discern justice, when we 
discern truth, we do nothing of ourselves, but allow a passage 
to its beams. If we ask whence this comes, if we seek to pry 
into the soul that causes, all philosophy is at fault. Its 
presence or its absence is all we can affirm. Every man dis¬ 
criminates between the voluntary acts of his mind and his 
involuntary perceptions, and knows that to his involuntary 
perceptions a perfect faith is due. He may err in the expres¬ 
sion of them, but he knows that these things are so, like day 
and night, not to be disputed. My wilful actions and acqui¬ 
sitions are but roving; — the idlest reverie, the faintest native 
emotion, command my curiosity and respect. Thoughtless 
people contradict as readily the statement of perceptions as 
of opinions, or rather much more readily; for they do not 
distinguish between perception and notion. They fancy 
that I choose to see this or that thing. But perception is not 
whimsical, but fatal. If I see a trait, my children will see it 
after me, and in course of time all mankind, — although it 
may chance that no one has seen it before me. For my per¬ 
ception of it is as much a fact as the sun. 

The relations of the soul to the divine spirit are so pure 
that it is profane to seek to interpose helps. It must be that 
when Gocl speaketh he should communicate, not one thing, 
but all things; should fill the world with his voice; should 
scatter forth light, nature, time, souls, from the centre of the 
present thought; and new date and new create the whole. 
Whenever a mind is simple and receives a divine wisdom, then 
old things pass away, — means, teachers, texts, temples fall; 
it lives now, and absorbs past and future into the present 
hour. All things are made sacred by relation to it, — one 
thing as much as another. All things are dissolved to their 
centre by their cause, and in the universal miracle petty 
and particular miracles disappear. If therefore a man claims 
to know and speak of God and carries you backward to the 


208 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


phraseology of some old mouldered nation in another country, 
in another world, believe him not. Is the acorn better than the 
oak which is its fulness and completion? Is the parent better 
than the child into whom he has cast his ripened being? 
Whence then this worship of the past? The centuries are 
conspirators against the sanity and authority of the soul. 
Time and space are but physiological colors which the eye 
makes, but the soul is light; where it is, is day; where it was, 
is night; and history is an impertinence and an injury if it be 
any thing more than a cheerful apologue or parable of my 
being and becoming. 

Man is timid and apologetic; he is no longer upright; he 
dares not say “I think”, “I am”, but quotes some saint or 
sage. He is ashamed before the blade of grass or the blowing 
rose. These roses under my window make no reference to 
former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are, 
they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. There 
is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its exis¬ 
tence. Before a leaf-bud has burst, its whole life acts; in the 
full-blown flower there is no more; in the leafless root there 
is no less. Its nature is satisfied and it satisfies nature in all 
moments alike. But man postpones or remembers; he does 
not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the 
past, or, heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on 
tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot be happy and strong 
until he too lives with natuYe in the present, above time. 

This should be plain enough. Yet see what strong intellects 
dare not yet hear God himself unless he speak the phraseology 
of I know not what David, or Jeremiah, or Paul. We shall 
not always set so great a price on a few texts, on a few lives. 
We are like children who repeat by rote the sentences of 
grandames and tutors, and, as they grow older, of the men of 
talents and character they chance to see, — painfully recol¬ 
lecting the exact words they spoke; afterwards, when they 
come into the point of view which those had who uttered these 


SELF-RELIANCE 


209 


sayings, they understand them and are willing to let the 
words go; for any time they can use words as good when 
occasion comes. So was it with us, so will it be, if we proceed. 
If we live truly, we shall see truly. It is as easy for the strong 
man to be strong, as it is for the weak to be weak. When we 
have new perception, we shall gladly disburden the memory 
of its hoarded treasures as old rubbish. When a man lives 
with God, his voice shall be as sweet as the murmur of the 
brook and the rustle of the corn. 

And now at last the highest truth on this subject remains 
unsaid; probably cannot be said; for all that we say is the 
far-off remembering of the intuition. That thought by what 
I can now nearest approach to say it, is this. When good is 
near you, when you have life in yourself, it is not by any 
known or accustomed way; you shall not discern the foot¬ 
prints of any other; you shall not see the face of man; you 
shall not hear any name; — the way, the thought, the good, 
shall be wholly strange and new. It shall exclude example and 
experience. You take the way from man, not to man. All 
persons that ever existed are its forgotten ministers. Fear 
and hope are alike beneath it. There is somewhat low even in 
hope. In the hour of vision there is nothing that can be called 
gratitude, nor properly joy. The soul raised over passion 
beholds identity and eternal causation, perceives the self¬ 
existence of Truth and Right, and calms itself with knowing 
that all things go well. Vast spaces of nature; the Atlantic 
Ocean, the South Sea; long intervals of time, years, cen¬ 
turies, are of no account. This which I think and feel under¬ 
lay every former state of life and circumstances, as it does 
underlie my present and what is called life and what is called 
death. 

Life only avails, not the having lived. Power ceases in the 
instant of repose; it resides in the moment of transition from 
a past to a new state, in the shooting of the gulf, in the darting 
to an aim. This one fact the world hates; that the soul 


210 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


becomes; for that forever degrades the past, turns all riches to 
poverty, all reputation to a shame; confounds the saint with 
the rogue; shoves Jesus and Judas equally aside. Why then 
do we prate of self-reliance? Inasmuch as the soul is present 
there will be power not confident but agent. To talk of reli¬ 
ance is a poor external way of speaking. Speak rather of that 
which relies because it works and is. Who has more obedience 
than I masters me, though he should not raise his finger. 
Round him I must revolve by the gravitation of spirits. 
We fancy it rhetoric when we speak of eminent virtue. We 
do not yet see that virtue is Height, and that a man or a 
company of men, plastic and permeable to principles, by the 
law of nature must overpower and ride all cities, nations, 
kings, rich men, poets, who are not. 

This is the ultimate fact which we so quickly reach on this, 
as on every topic, the resolution of all into the ever-blessed 
One. Self-existence is the attribute of the Supreme Cause, 
and it constitutes the measure of good by the degree in which 
it enters into all lower forms. All things real are so by so much 
virtue as they contain. Commerce, husbandry, hunting, 
whaling, war, eloquence, personal weight, are somewhat, and 
engage my respect as examples of its presence and impure 
action. I see the same law working in nature for conservation 
and growth. Power is, in Nature, the essential measure of 
right. Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdoms 
which cannot help itself. The genesis and maturation of a 
planet, its poise and orbit, the bended tree recovering itself 
from the strong wind, the vital resources of every animal and 
vegetable, are demonstrations of the self-sufficing and there¬ 
fore self-relying soul. 

Thus all concentrates; let us not rove; let us sit at home 
with the cause. Let us stun and astonish the intruding rabble 
of men and books and institutions by a simple declaration of 
the divine fact. Bid the invaders take the shoes from off their 
feet, for God is here within. Let our simplicity judge them, 


SELF-RELIANCE 


211 


and our docility to our own law demonstrate the poverty of 
nature and fortune beside our native riches. 

But now we are a mob. Man does not stand in awe of man, 
nor is his genius admonished to stay at home, to put itself in 
communication with the internal ocean, but it goes abroad to 
beg a cup of water of the urns of men. We must go alone. 
Isolation must precede true society. I like the silent church 
before the service begins, better than any preaching. How 
far off, how cool, how chaste the persons look, begirt each one 
with a precinct or sanctuary! So let us always sit. Why 
should we assume the faults of our friend, or wife, or father, 
or child, because they sit around our hearth, or are said to 
have the same blood? All men have my blood and I have all 
men’s. Not for that will I adopt their petulance or folly, 
even to the extent of being ashamed of it. But your isolation 
must not be mechanical, but spiritual, that is, must be eleva¬ 
tion. At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to 
importune you with emphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, 
sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet 
door and say, “Come out unto us’’. But keep thy state; 
come not into their confusion. The power men possess to 
annoy me I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come 
near me but through my act. “What we love that we have, 
but by desire we bereave ourselves of the love.’’ 

If we cannot at once rise to the sanctities of obedience and 
faith, let us at least resist our temptations; let us enter into 
the state of war and wake Thor and Woden , 22 courage and 
constancy, in our Saxon breasts. This is to be done in our 
smooth times by speaking the truth. Check this lying hos¬ 
pitality and lying affection. Live no longer to the expectation 
of these deceived and deceiving people with whom we converse. 
Say to them, “ O father, O mother, O wife, O brother, O friend, 
I have lived with you after appearances hitherto. Hence¬ 
forward I am the truth’s. Be it known unto you that hence¬ 
forward I obey no law less than the eternal law. I will have 


212 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


no covenants but proximities. I shall endeavor to nourish my 
parents, to support my family, to be the chaste husband of 
one wife, — but these relations I must fill after a new and 
unprecedented way. I appeal from your customs. I must be 
myself. I cannot break myself any longer for you, or you. 
If you can love me for what I am, we shall be the happier. 
If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I 
must be myself. I will not hide my tastes or aversions. I 
will so trust that what is deep is holy, that I will do strongly 
before the sun and moon whatever inly rejoices me and the 
heart appoints. If you are noble, I will love you; if you are 
not, I will not hurt you and myself by hypocritical attentions. 
If you are true, but not in the same truth with me, cleave to 
your companions; I will seek my own. I do this not selfishly 
but humbly and truly. It is alike your interest, and mine, 
and all men’s, however long we have dwelt in lies, to live in 
truth. Does this sound harsh to-day? You will soon love 
what is dictated by your nature as well as mine, and if we 
follow the truth it will bring us out safe at last.” — But so 
may you give these friends pain. Yes, but I cannot sell my 
liberty and my power, to save their sensibility. Besides, all 
persons have their moments of reason, when they look out into 
the region of absolute truth; then will they justify me and do 
the same thing. 

The populace think that your rejection of popular standards 
is a rejection of all standard, and mere antinomianism ; 23 
and the bold sensualist will use the name of philosophy to gild 
his crimes. But the law of consciousness abides. There are 
two confessionals, in one or the other of which we must be 
shriven. You may fulfil your round of duties by clearing 
yourself in the direct , or in the reflex way. Consider whether 
you have satisfied your relations to father, mother, cousin, 
fteighbor, town, cat, and dog; whether any of these can up¬ 
braid you. But I may also neglect this reflex standard and 
absolve me to myself. I have my own stern claims and perfect 


SELF-RELIANCE 


213 


circle. It denies the name of duty to many offices that are 
called duties. But if I can discharge its debts it enables me 
to dispense with the popular code. If any one imagines that 
this law is lax, let him keep its commandment one day. 

And truly it demands something godlike in him who has 
cast off the common motives of humanity and has ventured to 
trust himself for a task-master. High be his heart, faithful 
his will, clear his sight, that he may in good earnest be doc¬ 
trine, society, law, to himself, that a simple purpose may be to 
him as strong as iron necessity is to others! 

If any man consider the present aspects of what is called by 
distinction society , he will see the need of these ethics. The 
sinew and heart of man seem to be drawn out, and we are 
become timorous desponding whimperers. We are afraid of 
truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid of each 
other. Our age yields no great and perfect persons. We 
want men and women who shall renovate life and our social 
state, but we see that most natures are insolvent; cannot 
satisfy their own wants, have an ambition out of all propor¬ 
tion to their practical force, and so do lean and beg day and 
night continually. Our housekeeping is mendicant, our arts, 
our occupations, our marriages, our religion we have not 
chosen, but society has chosen for us. We are parlor soldiers. 
We shun the rugged battle of fate, where strength is born. 

If our young men miscarry in their first enterprizes they 
lose all heart. If the young merchant fails, men say he is 
ruined. If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges and 
is not installed in an office within one year afterwards in the 
cities or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his 
friends and to himself that he is right in being disheartened 
and in complaining the ••rest of his life. A sturdy lad from 
New Hampshire or Vermont, who in turn tries all the 
professions, who teams it, farms it, peddles, keeps a school, 
preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a town¬ 
ship, and so forth, in successive years, and always like a cat 


214 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


falls on his feet, is worth a hundred of these city dolls. 
He walks abreast with his days and feels no shame in not 
“studying a profession”, for he does not postpone his life, but 
lives already. He has not one chance, but a hundred chances. 
Let a Stoic 24 open the resources of man and tell men they are 
not leaning willows, but can and must detach themselves; that 
with the exercise of self-trust, new powers shall appear; that 
a man is the word made flesh, born to shed healing to the 
nations; that he should be ashamed of our compassion, and 
that the moment he acts from himself, tossing the laws, the 
books, idolatries and customs out of the window, — we pity 
him no more but thank and revere him; — and that teacher 
shall restore the life of man to splendor and make his name 
dear to all history. 

It is easy to see that a greater self-reliance must work a 
revolution in all the offices and relations of men; in their 
religion; in their education; in their pursuits; their modes 
of living; their association; in their property; in their 
speculative views. 

I. In what prayers do men allow themselves! That which 
they call a holy office is not so much as brave and manly. 
Prayer looks abroad and asks for some foreign addition to 
come through some foreign virtue, and loses itself in endless 
mazes of natural and supernatural, and mediatorial and mi¬ 
raculous. Prayer that craves a particular commodity — 
anything less than all good, is vicious. Prayer is the con¬ 
templation of the facts of life from the highest point of view. 
It is the soliloquy of a beholding and jubilant soul. It is the 
spirit of God pronouncing his works good. But prayer as a 
means to effect a private end is meanness and theft. It 
supposes dualism and not unity in nature and consciousness. 
As soon as the man is at one with God, he will not beg. He 
will then see prayer in all action. The prayer of the farmer 
kneeling in his field to weed it, the prayer of the rower kneel¬ 
ing with the stroke of his oar, are true prayers heard through- 


SELF-RELIANCE 


215 


out nature, though for cheap ends. Caratach , 25 in Fletcher’s 
Bonduca, when admonished to inquire the mind of the god 
Audate, replies, 

“His hidden meaning lies in our endeavors; 

Our valors are our best gods.” 

Another sort of false prayers are our regrets. Discontent 
is the want of self-reliance: it is infirmity of will. Regret 
calamities if you can thereby help the sufferer; if not, attend 
your own work and already the evil begins to be repaired. 
Our sympathy is just as base. We come to them who weep 
foolishly and sit down and cry for company, instead of im¬ 
parting to them truth and health in rough electric shocks, 
putting them once more in communication with their own 
reason. The secret of fortune is joy in our hands. Welcome 
evermore to gods and men is the self-helping man. For him 
all doors are flung wide. Him all tongues greet, all honors 
crown, all eyes follow with desire. Our love goes out to him 
and embraces him because he did not need it. We solicitously 
and apologetically caress and celebrate him because he held 
on his way and scorned our disapprobation. The gods love 
him because men hated him. “To the persevering mortal,” 
said Zoroaster , 26 “the blessed Immortals are swift.” 

As men’s prayers are a disease of the will, so are their creeds 
a disease of the intellect. They say with those foolish Israel¬ 
ites, “Let not God speak to us, lest we die. Speak thou, 
speak any man with us, and we will obey.” Everywhere I am 
hindered of meeting God in my brother, because he has shut 
his own temple doors and recites fables merely of his brother’s, 
or his brother’s brother’s God. Every new mind is a new 
classification. If it prove a mind of uncommon activity and 
power, a Locke , 27 a Lavoisier , 28 a Hutton , 29 a Bentham , 30 a 
Fourier , 31 it imposes its classification on other men, and lo! a 
new system. In proportion to the depth of the thought, and 
so to the number of the objects it touches and brings within 


216 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


reach of the pupil, is his complacency. But chiefly is this 
apparent in creeds and churches, which are also classifications 
of some powerful mind acting on the great elemental thought 
of Duty and man’s relation to the Highest. Such is Calvinism, 
Quakerism, Swedenborgism. The pupil takes the same delight 
in subordinating every thing to the new terminology as a girl 
who has just learned botany in seeing a new earth and new 
seasons thereby. It will happen for a time that the pupil 
will find his intellectual power has grown by the study of his 
master’s mind. But in all unbalanced minds the classification 
is idolized, passes for the end and not for a speedily exhaustible 
means, so that the walls of the system blend to their eye in the 
remote horizon with the walls of the universe; the luminaries 
of heaven seem to them hung on the arch their master built. 
They cannot imagine how you aliens have any right to see — 
how you can see; “It must be somehow that you stole the 
light from us.” They do not yet perceive that light, un¬ 
systematic, indomitable, will break into any cabin, even into 
theirs. Let them chirp awhile and call it their own. If they 
are honest and do well, presently their neat new pinfold will 
be too straight and low, will crack, will lean, will rot and 
vanish, and the immortal light, all young and joyful, million- 
orbed, million-colored, will beam over the universe as on the 
first morning. 

2. It is for want of self-culture that the superstition of 
Traveling, whose idols are Italy, England, Egypt, retains its 
fascination for all educated Americans. They who made 
England, Italy, or Greece venerable in the imagination, did so 
by sticking fast where they were, like an axis of the earth. 
In manly hours we feel that duty is our place. The soul is 
no traveller; the wise man stays at home, and when his 
necessities, his duties, on any occasion call him from his 
house, or into foreign lands, he is at home still, and shall 
make men sensible by the expression of his countenance 
that he goes, the missionary of wisdom and virtue, and visits 


SELF-RELIANCE 217 

cities and men like a sovereign and not like an interloper or a 
valet. 

I have no churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the 
globe for the purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so 
that the man is first domesticated, or does not go abroad with 
the hope of finding somewhat greater than he knows. He who 
travels to be amused or to get somewhat which he does not 
carry, travels away from himself, and grows old even in youth 
among old things. In Thebes, 32 in Palmyra, 33 his will and 
mind have become old and dilapidated as they. He carries 
ruins to ruins. 

Travelling is a fool’s paradise. Our first journeys discover 
to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at 
Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty and lose 
my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark 
on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside 
me is the stern Fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that 
I fled from. I seek the Vatican 34 and the palaces. I affect to 
be intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go. 

3. But the rage of travelling is a symptom of a deeper 
unsoundness affecting the whole intellectual action. The 
intellect is vagabond, and our system of education fosters 
restlessness. Our minds travel when our bodies are forced 
to stay at home. We imitate; and what is imitation but the 
travelling of the mind? Our houses are built with foreign 
taste; our shelves are garnished with foreign ornaments; 
our opinions, our tastes, our faculties, lean, and follow the 
Past and the Distant. The soul created the arts wherever 
they have flourished. It was in his own mind that the artist 
sought his model. It was an application of his own thought to 
the thing to be done and the conditions to be observed. And 
why need we copy the Doric 35 or the Gothic model? Beauty, 
convenience, grandeur of thought, and quaint expression are 
as near to us as to any, and if the American artist will study 
with hope and love the precise thing to be done by him, con- 


218 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


sidering the climate, the soil, the length of the day, the wants 
of the people, the habit and form of the government, he will 
create a house in which all these will find themselves fitted, 
and taste and sentiment will be satisfied also. 

Insist on yourself, never imitate. Your own gift you can 
present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole 
life’s cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you 
have only an extemporaneous half possession. That which 
each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him. No 
man yet knows what it is, nor can, till that person has ex¬ 
hibited it. Where is the master who could have taught 
Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed 
Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great 
man is a unique. The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that 
part he could not borrow. Shakespeare will never be made by 
the study of Shakespeare, Do that which is assigned you 
and you cannot hope too much or dare too much. There is at 
this moment for you an utterance brave and grand as that 
of the colossal chisel of Phidias, 36 or trowel of the. Egyptians, 
or the pen of Moses or Dante, but different from all these. 
Not possibly will the soul, all rich, all eloquent, with thousand- 
cloven tongue, deign to repeat itself; but if you can hear 
what these patriarchs say, surely you can reply to them in 
the same pitch of voice; for the ear and the tongue are two 
organs of one nature. Abide in the simple and noble regions 
of thy life, obey thy heart, and thou shalt reproduce the 
Fore world 37 again. 

4. As our Religion, our Education, our Art look abroad, so 
does our spirit of society. All men plume themselves on the 
improvement of society, and no man improves. 

Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it 
gains on the other. It undergoes continual changes; it is 
barbarous, it is civilized, it is christianized, it is rich, it is 
scientific; but this change is not amelioration. For every 
thing that is given something is taken. Society acquires new 


SELF-RELIANCE 


219 


arts and loses old instincts. What a contrast between the 
well-clad, reading, writing, thinking American, with a watch, 
a pencil, and a bill of exchange in his pocket, and the naked 
New Zealander, whose property is a club, a spear, a mat, and 
an undivided twentieth of a shed to sleep under! But com¬ 
pare the health of the two men and you shall see that the 
white man has lost his aboriginal strength. If the traveller 
tell us truly, strike the savage with a broad axe and in a day 
or two the flesh shall unite and heal as if you struck the blow 
into soft pitch, and the same blow shall send the white to his 
grave. 

The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of 
his feet. He is supported on crutches, but lacks so much 
support of muscle. He has got a fine Geneva 38 watch, but he 
fails of the skill to tell the hour by the sun. A Greenwich 39 
nautical almanac he has, and so being sure of the information 
when he wants it, the man in the street does not know a star 
in the sky. The solstice he does not observe; the equinox he 
knows as little; and the whole bright calendar of the year is 
without a dial in his mind. His note-books impair his 
memory; his libraries overload his wit; the insurance-office 
increases the number of accidents; and it may be a question 
whether machinery does not encumber; whether we have not 
lost by refinement some energy, by a Christianity entrenched 
in establishments and forms some vigor of wild virtue. For 
every Stoic was a Stoic; but in Christendom where is the 
Christian? 

There is no more deviation in the moral standard than in 
the standard of height or bulk. No greater men are now than 
ever were. A singular equality may be observed between the 
great men of the first and of the last ages; nor can all the 
science, art, religion, and philosophy of the nineteenth century 
avail to educate greater men than Plutarch’s heroes, three or 
four and twenty centuries ago. Not in time is the race pro¬ 
gressive. Phocion, 40 Socrates, Anaxagoras, 41 Diogenes, 42 are 


220 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


great men, but they leave no class. He who is really of their 
class will not be called by their name, but be his own man, and 
in his turn the founder of a sect. The arts and inventions of 
each period are only its costume and do not invigorate men. 
The harm of the improved machinery may compensate its 
good. Hudson 43 and Behring 44 accomplished so much in 
their fishing-boats as to astonish Parry 45 and Franklin , 46 
whose equipment exhausted the resources of science and art. 
Galileo , 47 with an opera-glass, discovered a more splendid 
series of celestial phenomena than any one since. Columbus 
found the New World in an undecked boat. It is curious to see 
the periodical disuse and perishing of means and machinery 
which were introduced with loud laudation a few years or 
centuries before. The great genius returns to essential man. 
We reckoned the improvements of the art of war among the 
triumphs of science, and yet Napoleon conquered Europe by 
the Bivouac , 48 which consisted of falling back on naked valor 
and disencumbering it of all aids. The Emperor held it 
impossible to make a perfect army, says Las Casas , 49 “with¬ 
out abolishing our arms, magazines, commissaries, and car¬ 
riages, until, in imitation of the Roman custom, the soldier 
should receive his supply of corn, grind it in his hand-mill, 
and bake his bread himself.” 

Society is a wave. The wave moves onward, but the water 
of which it is composed does not. The same particle does 
not rise from the valley to the ridge. Its unity is only phe¬ 
nomenal. The persons who make up a nation to-day, next 
year die, and their experience dies with them. 

And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on 
governments which protect it, is the want of self-reliance. 
Men have looked away from themselves and at things so long 
that they have come to esteem the religious, learned, and civil 
institutions as guards of property, and they deprecate assaults 
on these, because they feel them to be assaults on property. 
They measure their esteem of eachr other by what each has, 


SELF-RELIANCE 


221 


and not by what each is. But a cultivated man becomes 
ashamed of his property, out of new respect for his nature. 
Especially he hates what he has if he see that it is accidental, 
— came to him by inheritance, or gift, or crime; then he feels 
that it is not having; it does not belong to him, has no root 
in him, and merely lies there because no revolution or no 
robber takes it away. But that which a man is, does always 
by necessity acquire; and what the man acquires, is living 
property, which does not wait the beck of rulers, or mobs, or 
revolutions, or fire, or storm, or bankruptcies, but perpetually 
renews itself wherever the man breathes. “Thy lot or portion 
of life,” said the Caliph Ali , 50 “is seeking after thee; therefore 
be at rest from seeking after it.” Our dependence on these 
foreign goods leads us to our slavish respect for numbers. 
The political parties meet in numerous conventions; the 
greater the concourse and with each new uproar of announce¬ 
ment, The delegation from Essex! The Democrats from New 
Hampshire! The Whigs of Maine! the young patriot feels 
himself stronger than before by a new thousand of eyes and 
arms. In like manner the reformers summon conventions 
and vote and resolve in multitude. But not so O friends! 
will the God deign to enter and inhabit you, but by a method 
precisely the reverse. It is only as a man puts off all foreign 
support and stands alone that I see-him to be strong and to 
prevail. He is weaker by every recruit to his banner. Is not 
a man better than a town? Ask nothing of men, and, in the 
endless mutation, thou only firm column must presently ap¬ 
pear the upholder of all that surrounds thee. He who knows 
that power is inborn, that he is weak only because he has 
looked for good out of him and elsewhere, and, so perceiving, 
throws himself unhesitatingly on his thought, instantly rights 
himself, stands in the erect position, commands his limbs, 
works miracles; just as a man who stands on his feet is 
stronger than a man who stands on his head. 

So use all that is called Fortune. Most men gamble with 


222 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


her, and gain all, and lose all, as her wheel rolls. But do thou 
leave as unlawful these winnings, and deal with Cause and 
Effect, the chancellors of God. In the Will work and acquire, 
and thou hast chained the wheel of Chance, and shalt sit out 
hereafter out of fear from her rotations. A political victory, a 
rise of rents, the recovery of your sick or the return of your 
absent friend, or some other favorable event raises your 
spirits, and you think good days are preparing for you. Do 
not believe it. Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. 
Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles. 


NOTES 

1 This is an illustration of the quality that makes Emerson a 
Transcendentalist and a mystic. 

2 The River of Oblivion in the classical underworld, used here 
as a symbol for an anodyne or drug. 

3 This is especial evidence of Emerson’s extreme individual¬ 
ism, which this essay as a whole illustrates. In his Journal, “At 
Harrisburg, April,” 1850, he records a conversation with an 
old Quaker, W. L. Fisher, with whom he held “sweet counsel”, 
in which both agree that the “personal force”, “the vital power 
in Man” is responsible for all social accomplishment. 

4 An island of the British West Indies, thought to be named 
from the Indian fig tree which the Portugese call las barbadas , 
meaning “the bearded”. 

6 Cf. Genesis XXXIX, 7-20. 

6 Commented on in the other essays. 

7 The Andes Mountains in South America and the Himalaya 
Mountains in India. 

8 An iambic hexameter verse, sometimes having an added 
syllable; so named because used in early French romances con¬ 
cerning Alexander the Great. 

9 Anything of a short life. 

10 The Spartans were very economical of words. They indulged 
in no luxuries, either at table or elsewhere. 

11 The monastic manner of life; the principle or practice of 
living as monks and nuns. Saint Anthony (251-ea. 356), one of 
the Christian Fathers, was the founder of Christian monastic life. 

12 The great religious revolution of the sixteenth century, end¬ 
ing in the establishment of Protestantism. Luther (1483-1546) 
was the leader of the Reformation. 

13 The form of belief cherished by the religious body called the 


SELF-RELIANCE 


223 

Society of Friends, founded by George Fox, a religious reformer 
of the seventeenth century. 

14 The spirit, doctrine, and worship of the religious body known 
as Methodists, which grew out of a religious movement begun at 
Oxford in the earlier half of the eighteenth century, starting in 
the students’ club for religious improvement and study of the 
Bible in which John Wesley (1703-1791) as a leader was associ¬ 
ated with Charles Wesley, George Whitefield, and others. 

15 Refers here to the legal extinction of slavery sponsored by 
Thomas Clarkson (1760-1846), an English philanthropist. 

16 There were two Scipios, Scipio Africanus the Elder (237- 
183 B.c.), Roman general and consul, who defeated Hannibal at 
Zama, 202 B.C., and Scipio Africanus the Younger (185-129 B.C.), 
Roman general and consul who burned Carthage. 

17 The same story which forms the Induction to the Taming 
of the Shrew of Shakespere. 

18 Alfred the Great, king of the West Saxons in England; 
repelled the invasions of the Danes; established the English navy 
(849-901). 

19 George Castriot, an Albanian chief, who maintained the in¬ 
dependence of his principality against the Turks (1594-1632). 

20 The king of Sweden prominent in the Thirty Years War, a 
great defender of the cause of Protestantism (1594-1632). 

21 Such displacement of an object’s actual position in space as 
would appear if the object were viewed from some other than the 
standard point. An astronomical term. 

22 Thor was the Scandinavian god of war, thunder, and agri¬ 
culture. Woden was chief of the gods, lord of battle and victory, 
source of wisdom and culture, founder of writing, poetry, and 
history. 

23 The doctrine that faith frees the Christian from the claims 
and obligations of the moral law; taught by John Agricola in 
Germany about 1535. 

24 Member of one of the chief schools of Greek philosophy 
founded by Zeno about 308 B .c. 

26 Act I, Scene 1. John Fletcher was an English dramatic 
poet, collaborator of Beaumont (1579-1625). 

26 The traditional founder of the ancient Irano-Persian religion, 
who flourished about 60 b.c. 

27 See page 23, note 53. 

28 Lavoisier , Antoine Lourent, a French chemist, founder of 
modern chemistry (1743-1794). 

29 There are various celebrities by the name of Hutton. Here 
we may have mention of Charles Hutton (1737-1823), an English 
mathematician; or James Hutton (1726-1797), a Scottish phy¬ 
sician, geologist, and author of the Plutonic theory of geology. 

30 Bentham, Jeremy, an English jurist, exponent of the doctrine 
of utilitarianism (1748-1832). 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


224 

31 See page 125, note 48. 

32 Ancient capital of upper Egypt. 

33 An ancient city on an oasis of the Syrian desert, site of ex¬ 
tensive ruins. 

34 Palace of the popes in Rome. 

35 Doric is used here as a type of the classical and Gothic as a 
type of the mediaeval. 

36 Phidias was the most celebrated sculptor of ancient Greece. 

37 Antediluvian world. 

38 City in Switzerland famous for its watchmaking. 

39 A river port in Kent near London, containing a royal ob¬ 
servatory. Its meridian is the prime or zero meridian for mari¬ 
time purposes. 

40 Athenian general and patriot ( ca . 402-317). 

41 Greek philosopher, regarded as the father of modern science 
(500-428 B.C.). 

42 A Greek cynic philosopher, said to have lived in a tub and 
sought at midday with a lantern for an honest man (412-325 b.c.). 

43 Hudson , Hendrik, an English navigator in the service of the 
Dutch who explored the Hudson River (1575-1611). 

44 Behring , Vitus, a Danish navigator who discovered Bering 
Sea and Straits (1680-1741). 

45 Parry , Sir William Edward, British admiral and Arctic ex¬ 
plorer (1790-1855). 

46 Franklin , Sir John, English Arctic explorer (1786-1847). 

47 See page 193, note 34. 

48 Temporary or open-air camp. 

49 See page 171, note 18. 

# 60 The fourth of the immediate successors of Mohammed and 
his adopted son {ca. 600-661). 


COMPENSATION 


jp VER since I was a boy I have wished to write a discourse 
on Compensation; for it seemed to me when very young 
that on this subject life was ahead of theology and the people 
knew more than the preachers taught. The documents too 
from which the doctrine is to be drawn, charmed my fancy 
by their endless variety, and lay always before me, even in 
sleep; for they are the tools in our hands, the bread in our 
basket, the transactions of the street, the farm and the 
dwelling-house; greetings, relations, debts, and credits, the 
influence of character, the nature and endowment of all men. 
It seemed to me also that in it might be shown men a ray of 
divinity, the present action of the soul of this world, clean 
from all vestige of tradition; and so the heart of man might 
be bathed by an inundation of eternal love, conversing with 
that which he knows was always and always must be, be¬ 
cause it really is now. It appeared moreover that if this 
doctrine could be stated in terms with any resemblance to 
those bright intuitions in which this truth is sometimes re¬ 
vealed to us, it would be a star in many dark hours and 
crooked passages in our journey, that would not suffer us to 
lose our way. 

I was lately confirmed in these desires by hearing a sermon 
at church. The preacher, a man esteemed for his orthodoxy, 
unfolded in the ordinary manner the doctrine of the Last 
Judgment. He assumed that judgment is not executed in 
this world; that the wicked are successful; that the good are 
miserable; and then urged from reason and from Scripture a 
compensation to be made to both parties in the next life. No 
offence appeared to be taken by the congregation at this 

225 


226 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


doctrine. As far as I could observe when the meeting broke 
up they separated without remark on the sermon. 

Yet what was the import of this teaching? What did the 
preacher mean by saying that the good are miserable in the 
present life? Was it that houses and lands, offices, wine, 
horses, dress, luxury, are had by unprincipled men, whilst the 
saints are poor and despised; and that a compensation is to be 
made to these last hereafter, by giving them the like grati¬ 
fications another day, — bank-stock and doubloons, venison 
and champagne? This must be the compensation intended; 
for what else? Is it that they are to have leave to pray and 
praise? to love and serve men? Why, that they can do now. 
The legitimate inference the disciple would draw was, “We are 
to have such a good time as the sinners have now”; — or, to 
push it to its extreme import, — “You sin now, we shall sin 
by-and-by; we would sin now, if we could; not being success¬ 
ful we expect our revenge tomorrow.” 

The fallacy lay in the immense concession that the bad are 
successful; that justice is not done now. The blindness of the 
preacher consisted in deferring to the base estimate of the 
market of what constitutes a manly success, instead of con¬ 
fronting and convicting the world from the truth .announcing 
the presence of the soul; the omnipotence of the will; and so 
establishing the standard of good and ill, of success and false¬ 
hood. 

I find a similar base tone in the popular religious works of 
the day and the same doctrines assumed by the literary 
men when occasionally they treat the related topics. I think 
that our popular theology has gained in decorum, and not in 
principle, over the superstitions it has displaced. But men 
are better than their theology. Their daily life gives it the 
lie. Every ingenuous and aspiring soul leaves the doctrine 
behind him in his own experience, and all men feel sometimes 
the falsehood which they cannot demonstrate. For men are 
wiser than they know. That which they hear in schools and 


COMPENSATION 


227 

pulpits without afterthought, 1 if said in conversation would 
probably be questioned in silence. If a man dogmatize in a 
mixed company on Providence and the divine laws, he is 
answered by a silence which conveys well enough to an 
observer the dissatisfaction of the hearer, but his incapacity 
to make his own statement. 

I shall attempt in this and the following chapter 2 to record 
some facts that indicate the path of the law of Compensation; 
happy beyond my expectation if I shall truly draw the 
smallest arc of this circle. 

Polarity , 3 or action and reaction, we meet in every part of 
nature; in darkness and light; in heat and cold; in the ebb 
and flow of waters; in male and female; in the inspiration 
and pxpiration of plants and animals; in the equation of 
quantity on quality in the fluids of the animal body; in the 
systole and diastole 4 of the heart; in the undulations of fluids 
and of sound; in the centrifugal and centripetal gravity; 
in electricity, galvanism, and chemical affinity. Superinduce 
magnetism at one end of a needle, the opposite magnetism 
takes place at the other end. If the south attracts, the north 
repels. To empty here, you must condense there. An in¬ 
evitable dualism bisects nature, so that each thing is a half, 
and suggests another thing to make it whole; as, spirit, 
matter; man, woman; odd, even; subjective, objective; in, 
out; upper, under; motion, rest; yea, nay. 

Whilst the world is thus dual, so is £very one of its parts. 
The entire system of things gets represented in every particle. 
There is somewhat that resembles the ebb and flow of the sea, 
day and night, man and woman, in a single needle of the 
pine, in a kernel of corn, in each individual of every animal 
tribe. The reaction, so grand in the elements, is repeated 
within these small boundaries. For example, in the animal 
kingdom the physiologist has observed that no creatures are 
favorites, but a certain compensation balances every gift and 


228 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


every defect. A surplusage given to one part is paid out of a 
reduction from another part of the same creature. If the 
head and neck are enlarged, the trunk and extremities are 
cut short. 

The theory of the mechanic forces is another example. 
What we gain in power is lost in time, and the converse. 
The periodic or compensating errors of the planets is another 
instance. The influences of climate and soil in political history 
are another. The cold climate invigorates. The barren soil 
does not breed fevers, crocodiles, tigers, or scorpions. 

The same dualism underlies the nature and condition of 
man. Every excess causes a defect; every defect an excess. 
Every sweet hath its sour; every evil its good. Every faculty 
which is a receiver of pleasure has an equal penalty put on its 
abuse. It is to answer for its moderation with its life. For 
every grain of wit there is a grain of folly. For every thing 
you have missed, you have gained something else; and for 
every thing you gain, you lose something else. If riches 
increase, they are increased that use them. If the gatherer 
gathers too much, Nature takes out of the man what she puts 
into his chest; swells the estate, but kills the owner. Nature 
hates monopolies and exceptions. The waves of the sea do not 
more speedily seek a level from their loftiest tossing than the 
varieties of condition tend to equalize themselves. There is 
always some levelling circumstance that puts down the over¬ 
bearing, the strong, the rich, the fortunate, substantially 
on the same ground with all others. Is a man too strong and 
fierce for society and by temper and position a bad citizen, — 
a morose ruffian, with a dash of the pirate in him? — Nature 
sends him a troop of pretty sons and daughters who are getting 
along in the dame’s classes 5 at the village school, and love 
and fear for them smooths his grim scowl to courtesy. Thus 
she contrives to intenerate the granite and felspar, takes the 
boar out and puts the lamb in and keeps her balance true. 

The farmer imagines power and place are fine things. But 


COMPENSATION 


229 


the President has paid dear for his White House. It has 
commonly cost him all his peace, and the best of his manly 
attributes. To preserve for a short time so conspicuous an 
appearance before the world, he is content to eat dust before 
the real masters who stand erect behind the throne. Or do 
men desire the more substantial and permanent grandeur of 
genius? Neither has this an immunity. He who by force of 
will or of thought is great and overlooks thousands, has the 
charges of that eminence. With every influx of light comes 
new danger. Has he light? he must bear witness to the light, 
and always outrun that sympathy which gives him such keen 
satisfaction, by his fidelity to new revelations of the incessant 
soul. He must hate father and mother, wife and child. 6 Has 
he all that the world loves and covets and admires? — he 
must cast behind him their admiration and afflict them by 
faithfulness to his truth and become a byword and a hissing. 

This law writes the laws of cities and nations. It is in vain 
to build or plot or combine against it. Things refuse to be 
mismanaged long. Res nolunt diu male administrari . 7 Though 
no checks to a new evil appear, the checks exist, and will 
appear. If the government is cruel, the governor’s life is not 
safe. If you tax too high, the revenue will yield nothing. 
If you make the criminal code sanguinary, juries will not 
convict. If the law is too mild, private vengeance comes in. 
If the government is a terrific democracy, the pressure is 
resisted by an over-charge of energy in the citizen, and life 
glows with a fiercer flame. The true life and satisfactions of 
man seem to elude the utmost rigors or felicities of condition 
and to establish themselves with great indifferency under 
all varieties of circumstance. Under all governments the 
influence of character remains the same, — in Turkey and in 
New England about alike. Under the primeval despots of 
Egypt, history honestly confesses that man must have been as 
free as culture could make him. 

These appearances indicate the fact that the universe is 


230 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


represented in every one of its particles. Every thing in 
nature contains all the powers of nature. Every thing is made 
of one hidden stuff; as the naturalist 8 sees one type under 
every metamorphosis, and regards a horse as a running man, 
a fish as a swimming man, a bird as a flying man, a tree as a 
rooted man. Each new form repeats not only the main 
character of the type, but part for part all the details, all the 
aims, furtherances, hindrances, energies, and whole system of 
every other. Every occupation, trade, art, transaction, is 
a compend of the world and a correlative of every other. 
Each one is an entire emblem of human life; of its good and 
ill, its trials, its enemies, its course, and its end. And each 
one must somehow accommodate the whole man and recite 
all his destiny. 

The world globes itself in a drop of dew. The microscope 
cannot find the animacule which is less perfect for being little. 
Eyes, ears, taste, smell, motion, resistance, appetite, and 
organs of reproduction that take hold on eternity, — all find 
room to consist in the small creature. So do we put our 
life into every act. The true doctrine 9 of omnipresence is 
that God reappears with all his parts in every moss and 
cobweb. The value of the universe contrives to throw itself 
into every point. If the good is there, so is the evil; if the 
affinity, so the repulsion; if the force, so the limitation. 

Thus is the universe alive. All things are moral. That soul 
which within us is a sentiment, outside of us is a law. We 
feel its inspiration; out there in history we can see its fatal 
strength. “ It is in the world, and the world was made by it.” 
Justice is not postponed. A perfect equity adjusts its balance 
in all parts of life. 01 nvfioi Aids ael evTTLTTTovcrL , 10 — The 
dice of God are always loaded. 11 The world looks like a 
multiplication-table, or a mathematical equation, which, 
turn it how you will, balances itself. Take what figure you 
will, its exact value, nor more nor less, still returns to you. 
Every secret is told, every crime is punished, every virtue 


COMPENSATION 


231 


rewarded, every wrong redressed* in silence and certainty. 
What we call retribution is the universal necessity by which 
the whole appears wherever a part appears. If you see smoke, 
there must be fire. If you see a hand or a limb, you know that 
the trunk to which it belongs is there behind. 

Every act rewards itself, or in other words integrates itself, 
in a twofold manner; first in the thing, or in real nature; and 
secondly in the circumstance, or in apparent nature. Men 
call the circumstance the retribution. The causal retribu¬ 
tion is in the thing and is seen by the soul. The retribution in 
the circumstance is seen by the understanding; it is insepar¬ 
able from the thing, but is often spread over a long time and 
so does not become distinct until after many years. The 
specific stripes may follow late after the offence, but they 
follow because they accompany it. Crime and punishment 
grow out of one stem. Punishment is a fruit that unsuspected 
ripens within the flower of the pleasure which concealed it. 
Cause and effect, means and ends, seed and fruit, cannot be 
severed; for the effect already blooms in the cause, the end 
preexists in the means, the fruit in the seed. 

Whilst thus the world will be whole and refuses to be dis¬ 
parted, we seek to act partially, to sunder, to appropriate; 
for example, — to gratify the senses we sever the pleasure 
of the senses from the needs of the character. The ingenuity 
of man has been dedicated to the solution of one problem, — 
how to detach the sensual 12 sweet, the sensual strong, the 
sensual bright, etc., from the moral sweet, the moral deep, 
the moral fair; that is, again, to contrive to cut clean off this 
upper surface so thin as to leave it bottomless; to get a one 
end , without an other end. The soul says, “Eat”; the body 
would feast. The soul says, “The man and woman shall 
be one flesh and one soul ”; the body would join the flesh only. 
The soul says, “Have dominion over all things to the ends of 
virtue”; the body would have the power over things to its 
own ends. 


232 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


The soul strives amain to live and work through all things. 
It would be the only fact. All things shall be added unto it, — 
power, pleasure, knowledge, beauty. The particular man 
aims to be somebody; to set up for himself; to truck and 
higgle 13 for a private good; and, in particulars, to ride that 
he may ride; to dress that he may be dressed; to eat that he 
may eat; and to govern, that he may be seen. Men seek to be 
great; they would have offices, wealth, power, and fame. 
They think that to be great is to possess one side of nature, — 
the sweet, without the other side, the bitter. 

This dividing and detaching is steadily counteracted. Up 
to this day it must be owned no projector has had the smallest 
success. The parted water reunites behind our hand. 
Pleasure is taken out of pleasant things, profit out of profitable 
things, power out of strong things, as soon as we seek to 
separate them from the whole. We can no more halve things 
and get the sensual good, by itself, than we can get an inside 
that shall have no outside, or a light without a shadow. 
“Drive out Nature with a fork, 14 she comes running back.” 

Life invests itself with inevitable conditions, which the 
unwise seek to dodge, which one and another brags that he 
does not know, that they do not touch him; — but the brag 
is on his lips, the conditions are in his soul. If he escapes them 
in one part they attack him in another more vital part. 
If he has escaped them in form and in the appearance, it is 
because he has resisted his life and fled from himself, and the 
retribution is so much death. So signal is the failure of all 
attempts to make this separation of the good from the tax, 
that the experiment would not be tried, — since to try it is 
to be mad, — but for the circumstance that when the dis¬ 
ease began in the will, of rebellion and separation, the intellect 
is at once infected, so that the man ceases to see God whole 
in each object, but is able to see the sensual 15 allurement of an 
object and not see the sensual hurt; he sees the mermaid’s 
head but not the dragon’s tail, and thinks he can cut off 


COMPENSATION 


233 

that which he would have from that which'he would not have. 
“How secret art thou who dwellest in the highest heavens in 
silence, 16 O thou only great God, sprinkling with an unwearied 
providence certain penal blindnesses upon such as have un¬ 
bridled desires!”* 

The human soul is true to these facts in the painting of 
fable, of history, of law, of proverbs, of conversation. It 
finds a tongue in literature unawares. Thus the Greeks called 
Jupiter, Supreme Mind; but having traditionally ascribed 
to him many base actions, they involuntarily made amends 
to reason by tying up the hands of so bad a god. He is made 
as helpless as a king of England. Prometheus 17 knows one 
secret which Jove must bargain for; Minerva, 18 another. 
He cannot get his own thunders; Minerva keeps the key of 
them: — 

“Of all the gods, I only know the keys 19 
That ope the solid doors within whose vaults 
His thunders sleep.” 

A plain confession of the in-working of the All and of its moral 
aim. The Indian mythology ends in the same ethics; and it 
would seem impossible for any fable to be invented and get 
any currency which was not moral. Aurora 20 forgot to ask 
youth for her lover, and though Tithonous is immortal, he is 
old. Achilles is not quite invulnerable; 21 the sacred waters 
did not wash the heel by which Thetis held him. Siegfried, in 
the Nibelungen, 22 is not quite immortal, for a leaf fell on his 
back whilst he was bathing in the Dragon’s blood, and that 
spot which it covered is mortal. And so it must be. There is 
a crack in every thing God has made. It would seem there is 
always this vindictive circumstance stealing in at unawares 
even into the wild poesy in which the human fancy attempted 
to make bold holiday and to shake itself free of the old laws, — 
this back-stroke, this kick of the gun, certifying that the law 

* St. Augustine, Confessions, B. I. (Author’s note). 


234 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

is fatal; that in nature nothing can be given, all things are 
sold. 

This is that ancient doctrine of Nemesis, 23 who keeps watch 
in the Universe and lets no offence go unchastised. The 
Furies 24 they said are attendants on justice, and if the sun in 
heaven should transgress his path they would punish him. 
The poets related that stone walls and iron swords and leath¬ 
ern thongs had an occult sympathy with the wrongs of their 
owners; that the belt which Ajax 26 gave Hector 26 dragged 
the Trojan hero over the field at the wheels of the car of 
Achilles, 27 and the sword which Hector gave Ajax was that 
on whose point Ajax fell. They recorded that when the 
Thasians 28 erected a statue to Theogenes, 29 a victor in the 
games, one of his rivals went to it by night and endeavored to 
throw it down by repeated blows, until at last he moved it 
from its pedestal and was crushed to death beneath its fall. 

This voice of fable has in it somewhat divine. It came from 
thought above the will of the writer. That is the best part of 
each writer which has nothing private in it; that which he 
does not know; that which flowed out of his constitution and 
not from his too active invention; that which in the study of 
of a single artist you might not easily find, but in the study of 
many you would abstract as the spirit of them all. Phidias 30 
it is not, but the work of man in that early Hellenic world 
that I would know. The name and circumstance of Phidias, 
however convenient for history, embarrass when we come to 
the highest criticism. We are to see that which man was 
tending to do in a given period, and was hindered, or, if you 
will, modified in doing, by the interfering volitions of Phidias, 
of Dante, 31 of Shakespeare, the organ whereby man at the 
moment wrought. 

Still more striking is the expression of this fact in the pro¬ 
verbs of all nations, which are always the literature of reason, 
or the statements of an absolute truth without qualification. 
Proverbs, like the sacred books of each nation, are the sanctuary 


COMPENSATION 


235 


of the intuitions. That which the droning world, chained to 
appearances, will not allow the realist to say in his own words, 
it will suffer him to say in proverbs without contradiction. 
And this law of laws, which the pulpit, the senate, and the 
college deny, is hourly preached in all markets and workshops 
by flights of proverbs, whose teaching is as true and as omni¬ 
present as that of birds and flies. 

All things are double, one against another. —Tit for tat; 
an eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth; blood for blood; 
measure for measure; love for love. — Give, and it shall be 
given you. — He that watereth shall be watered himself. — 
“What will you have?” quoth God; pay for it and take it. — 
Nothing venture, nothing have. — Thou shalt be paid exactly 
for what thou hast done, no more, no less. — Who doth not 
work shall not eat. — Harm watch, harm catch. — Curses 
always recoil on the head of him who imprecates them. — If 
you put a chain around the neck of a slave, the other end 
fastens itself around your own. — Bad counsel confounds the 
adviser. — The Devil is an ass. 32 

It is thus written, because it is thus in life. Our action is 
overmastered and characterised above our will by the law of 
nature. We aim at a petty end quite aside from the public 
good, but our act arranges itself by irresistible magnetism in a 
line with the poles of the world. 

A man cannot speak but he judges himself. With his will 
or against his will he draws his portrait to the eye of his 
companions by every word. Every opinion reacts on him who 
utters it. It is a thread-ball thrown at a mark, but the other 
end remains in the thrower’s bag. Or rather it is a harpoon 
hurled at the whale, unwinding, as it flies, a coil of cord in 
the boat, and, if the harpoon is not good, or not well thrown, 
it will go nigh to cut the steersman in twain or to sink the 
boat. 

You cannot do wrong without suffering wrong. “No man 
had ever a point of pride that was not injurious to him,” said 


236 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

Burke. 33 The exclusive in fashionable life does not see that he 
excludes himself from enjoyment, in the attempt to appro¬ 
priate it. The exclusionist in religion does not see that he 
shuts the door of heaven on himself, in striving to shut out 
others. Treat men as pawns and ninepins and you shall suffer 
as well as they. If you leave out their heart, you shall lose 
your own. The senses would make things of all persons; of 
women, of children, of the poor. The vulgar proverb, “I 
will get it from his purse or get it from his skin”, is sound 
philosophy. 

All infractions of love and equity in our social relations 
are speedily punished. They are punished by fear. Whilst I 
stand in simple relations to my fellow-man, I have no dis¬ 
pleasure in meeting him. We meet as water meets water, or 
as two currents of air mix, with perfect diffusion and inter¬ 
penetration of nature. But as soon as there is any departure 
from simplicity and attempt at halfness, or good for me that 
is not good for him, my neighbor feels the wrong; he shrinks 
from me as far as I have shrunk from him; his eyes no longer 
seek mine; there is war between us; there is hate in him and 
fear in me. 

All the old abuses in society, universal and particular, all 
unjust accumulations of property and power, are avenged in 
the same manner. Fear is an instructor of great sagacity and 
the herald of all revolutions. One thing he teaches, that there 
is rottenness where he appears. He is a carrion crow, and 
though you see not well what he hovers for, there is death 
somewhere. Our property is timid, our laws are timid, our 
cultivated classes are timid. Fear for ages has boded and 
mowed and gibbered over government and property. That 
obscene bird is not there for nothing. He indicates great 
wrongs which must be revised. 

Of the like nature is that expectation of change which 
instantly follows the suspension of our voluntary activity. 
The terror of cloudless noon, the emerald of Polycrates, 34 


COMPENSATION 


237 


the awe of prosperity, the instinct which leads every generous 
soul to impose on itself tasks of a noble asceticism and vi¬ 
carious virtue, are the tremblings of the balance of justice 
through the heart and mind of man. 

Experienced men of the world know very well that it is 
best to pay scot and lot as they go along, and that a man 
often pays dear for a small frugality. The borrower runs in 
his own debt. Has a man gained any thing who has received a 
hundred favors and rendered none? Has he gained by borrow¬ 
ing, through indolence or cunning, his neighbor’s wares, or 
horses, or money? There arises on the deed the instant ac¬ 
knowledgment of benefit on the one part and of debt on the 
other; that is, of superiority and inferiority. The transaction 
remains in the memory of himself and his neighbor; and every 
new transaction alters according to its nature their relation to 
each other. He may soon come to see that he had better have 
broken his own bones than to have ridden in his neighbor’s 
coach, and that “ the highest price he can pay for a thing is to 
ask for it”. 

A wise man will extend this lesson to all parts of life, and 
know that it is always the part of prudence to face every 
claimant and pay every just demand on your time, your tal¬ 
ents, or your heart. Always pay; for first or last you must 
pay your entire debt. Persons and events may stand for a 
time between you and justice, but it is only a postponement. 
You must pay at last your own debt. If you are wise you will 
dread a prosperity which only loads you with more. Benefit is 
the end of nature. But for every benefit which you receive, a 
tax is levied. He is great who confers the most benefits. He 
is base, — and that is the one base thing in the universe, — to 
receive favors and render none. In the order of nature we 
cannot render benefits to those from whom we receive them, 
or only seldom. But the benefit we receive must be rendered 
again, line for line, deed for deed, cent for cent, to somebody. 
Beware of too much good staying in your hand. It will fast 
corrupt and worm worms. Pay it away quickly in some sort. 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


238 

Labor is watched over by the same pitiless laws. Cheapest, 
say the prudent, is the dearest labor. What we buy in a 
broom, a mat, a wagon, a knife, is some application of good 
sense to a common want. It is best to pay in your land a skil¬ 
ful gardener, or to buy good sense applied to gardening; in 
your sailor, good sense applied to navigation; in the house, 
good sense applied to cooking, sewing, 'serving; in your 
agent, good sense applied to accounts and affairs. So do you 
multiply your presence, or spread yourself throughout your es¬ 
tate. But because of the dual constitution of things, in labor 
as in life there can be no cheating. The thief steals from him¬ 
self. The swindler swindles himself. For the real price of 
labor is knowledge and virtue, whereof wealth and credit are 
signs. These signs, like paper money, may be counterfeited or 
stolen, but that which they represent, namely, knowledge and 
virtue, cannot be counterfeited or stolen. These ends of 
labor cannot be answered but by real exertions of the mind, 
and in obedience to pure motives. The cheat, the defaulter, 
the gambler, cannot extort the benefit, cannot extort the 
knowledge of material and moral nature which his honest care 
and pains yield to the operative. The law of nature is, Do the 
thing, and you shall have the power; but they who do not the 
the thing have not the power. 

Human labor, through all its forms, from the sharpening 
of a stake to the construction of a city or an epic, is one im¬ 
mense illustration of the perfect compensation of the universe. 
The absolute balance of Give and Take, the doctrine that 
every thing has its price, — and if that price is not paid, not 
that thing but something else is obtained, and that it is im¬ 
possible to get anything without its price, — is not less 
sublime in the columns of a ledger than in the budgets of 
states, in the laws of light and darkness, in all the action and 
reaction of nature. I cannot doubt that the high laws which 
each man sees ever implicated in those processes with which he 
is conversant, the stern ethics which sparkle on his chisel-edge, 


COMPENSATION 


239 


which are measured out by his plumb and foot-rule, which 
stand as manifest in the footing of the shop-bill as in the 
history of a state, — do recommend to him his trade, and 
though seldom named, exalt his business to his imagination. 

The league between virtue and nature engages all things to 
assume a hostile front to vice. The beautiful laws and sub¬ 
stances of the world persecute and whip the traitor. He 
finds that things are arranged for truth and benefit, but there 
is no den in the wide world to hide a rogue. Commit a crime, 
and the earth is made of glass. Commit a crime, and it seems 
as if a coat of snow fell on the ground, such as reveals in the 
woods the track of every partridge and fox and squirrel and 
mole. You cannot recall the spoken word, you cannot wipe 
out the foot-track, you cannot draw up the ladder, so as to 
leave no inlet or clew. Some damning circumstance always 
transpires. The laws and substances of nature, — water, 
snow, wind, gravitation, — become penalties to the thief. 

On the other hand the law holds with equal sureness for all 
right action. Love, and you shall be loved. All love is mathe¬ 
matically just, as much as two sides of an algebraic equation. 
The good man has absolute good, which like fire turns every, 
thing to its own nature, so that you cannot do him any harm; 
but as the royal armies sent against Napoleon, when he ap¬ 
proached cast down their colors and from enemies became 
friends, so disasters of all kinds, as sickness, offence, poverty, 
prove benefactors: — 

“Winds blow and waters roll 35 
Strength to the brave and power and deity, 

Yet in themselves are nothing.” 

The good are befriended even by weakness and defect. 
As no man had ever a point of pride that was not injurious to 
him, so no man had ever a defect that was not somewhere 
made useful to him. The stag in the fable 36 admired his 
horns and blamed his feet, but when the hunter came, his 


240 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


feet saved him, and afterwards, caught in the thicket, his 
horns destroyed him. Every man in his lifetime needs to 
thank his faults. As no man thoroughly understands a 
truth until he has contended against it, so no man has a thor¬ 
ough acquaintance with the hindrances or talents of men 
until he has suffered from the one and seen the triumph of the 
other over his own want of the same. Has he a defect of 
temper that unfits him to live in society? Thereby he is 
driven to entertain himself alone and acquire habits of self- 
help; and thus, like the wounded oyster, he mends his shell 
with pearl. 

Our strength grows out of our weakness. The indignation 
which arms itself with secret forces does not awaken until we 
are pricked and stung and sorely assailed. A great man is 
always willing to be little. Whilst he sits on the cushion of 
advantages, he goes to sleep. When he is pushed, tormented, 
defeated, he has a chance to learn something; he has been 
put on his wits, on his manhood; he has gained facts; learns 
his ignorance; is cured of the insanity of conceit; has got 
moderation and real skill. The wise man always throws him¬ 
self on the side of his assailants. It is more his interest than 
it is theirs to find his weak point. The wound cicatrizes and 
falls off from him like a dead skin and when they would 
triumph, lo! he has passed on invulnerable. Blame is safer 
than praise. I hate to be defended in a newspaper. As long 
as all that is said is said against me, I feel a certain assurance 
of success. But as soon as honeyed words of praise are 
spoken for me I feel as one that lies unprotected before his 
enemies. In general, every evil to which we do not succumb 
is a benefactor. As the Sandwich Islander believes that the 
strength and valor of the enemy he kills passes into himself, 
so we gain the strength of the temptation we resist. 

The same guards which protect us from disaster, defect, 
and enmity, defend us, if we will, from selfishness and fraud. 
Bolts and bars are not the best of our institutions, nor is 


COMPENSATION 


241 


shrewdness in trade a mark of wisdom. Men suffer all their 
life long under the foolish superstition that they can be 
cheated. But it is as impossible for a man to be cheated by 
any one but himself, as for a thing to be and not to be at the 
same time. There is a third silent party to all our bargains. 
The nature and soul of things takes on itself the guaranty of 
the fulfilment of every contract, so that honest service cannot 
come to loss. If you serve an ungrateful master, serve him 
the more. Put God in your debt. Every stroke shall be re¬ 
paid. The longer the payment is withholden, the better for 
you; for compound interest on compound interest is the rate 
and usage of this exchequer. 

The history of persecution is a history of endeavors to cheat 
nature, to make water run up hill, to twist a rope of sand. It 
makes no difference whether the actors be many or one, a 
tyrant or a mob. A mob is a society of bodies voluntarily be¬ 
reaving themselves of reason and traversing its work. The 
mob is man voluntarily descending to the nature of the beast. 
Its fit hour of activity is night. Its actions are insane, like its 
whole constitution. It persecutes a principle; it would whip 
a right; it would tar and feather justice, by inflicting fire 
and outrage upon the houses and persons of those who have 
these. It resembles the prank of boys, who run with fire- 
engines to put out the ruddy aurora streaming to the stars. 
The inviolate spirit turns their spite against the wrongdoers. 
The martyr cannot be dishonored. Every lash inflicted 
is a tongue of fame; every prison a more illustrious abode; 
every burned book or house enlightens the world; every 
suppressed or expunged word reverberates through the earth 
from side to side. Hours of sanity and consideration are 
always arriving to communities, as to individuals, when the 
truth is seen and the martyrs are justified. 

Thus do all things preach the indifferency of circumstances. 
The man is all. Every thing has two sides, a good and an evil. 
Every advantage has its tax. I learn to be content. But the 


242 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


doctrine of compensation is not the doctrine of indifferency. 
The thoughtless say, on hearing these representations, — 
“What boots 37 it to do well? there is one event to good and 
evil; If I gain any good I must pay for it; if I lose any good I 
gain some other; all actions are indifferent.” 

There is a deeper fact in the soul than compensation; to 
wit, its own nature. The soul is not a compensation, but a life. 
The soul is. Under all this running sea of circumstance, 
whose waters ebb and flow with perfect balance, lies the 
aboriginal abyss of real Being. Existence, or God, is not a 
relation or a part, but the whole. Being is the vast affirma¬ 
tive, excluding negation, self-balanced, and swallowing up all 
relations, parts, and times within itself. Nature, truth, virtue, 
are the influx from thence. Vice is the absence or departure 
of the same. Nothing, Falsehood, may indeed stand as the 
great Night or shade on which as a background the living 
universe paints itself forth; but no fact is begotten by it; it 
cannot work, for it is not. It cannot work any good; it can¬ 
not work any harm. It is harm inasmuch as it is worse not to 
be than to be. 

We feel defrauded of the retribution due to evil acts, be¬ 
cause the criminal adheres to his vice and contumacy and 
does not come to a crisis or judgment anywhere in visible 
nature. There is no stunning confutation of his nonsense be¬ 
fore men and angels. Has he therefore outwitted the law? 
Inasmuch as he carries the malignity and the lie with him 
he so far deceases from nature. In some manner there will be 
a demonstration of the wrong to the understanding also; but, 
should we not see it, this deadly deduction makes square the 
eternal account. 

Neither can it be said, on the other hand, that the gain of 
rectitude must be bought by any loss. There is no penalty to 
virtue; no penalty to wisdom; they are proper additions of 
being. In a virtuous action I properly am; in a virtuous act 
I add to the world; I plant into deserts conquered from Chaos 


COMPENSATION 


243 

and Nothing and see the darkness receding on the limits of the 
horizon. There can be no excess of love, none to knowledge, 
none to beauty, when these attributes are considered in the 
purest sense. The soul refuses limits and always affirms in 
man an Optimism, never a Pessimism. 

His life is a progress, and not a station. His instinct is 
trust. Our instinct uses “more” and “less” in application to 
man, always of the presence of the soul, and not of its absence; 
the brave man is greater than the coward; the true, the be¬ 
nevolent, the wise, is more a man and not less, than the fool 
and knave. There is no tax on the good of virtue, for that is 
the incoming of God himself, or absolute existence, without 
any comparative. Material good has its tax, and if it came 
without desert or sweat, has no root in me, and the next 
wind will blow it away. But all the good of nature is the 
soul’s, and may be had if paid for in nature’s lawful coin; 
that is, by labor which the heart and the head allow. I no 
longer tvish to meet a good I do not earn; for example to find a 
pot of buried gold, knowing that it brings with it new burdens. 
I do not wish more external goods, — neither possessions, nor 
honors, nor powers, nor persons. The gain is apparent; the 
tax is certain. But there is no tax on the knowledge that 
the compensation exists and that it is not desirable to dig up 
treasure. Herein I rejoice with a serene eternal peace. I 
contract the boundaries of possible mischief. I learn the 
wisdom of St. Bernard, 38 “Nothing can work me damage ex¬ 
cept myself; the harm that I sustain I carry about with me 
and never am a real sufferer but by my own fault.” 

In the nature of the soul is the compensation for the in¬ 
equalities of condition. The radical tragedy of nature seems 
to be the distinction of More and Less. How can Less not 
feel the pain; how not feel indignation or malevolence towards 
More? Look at those who have less faculty, and one feels 
sad and knows not well what to make of it. He almost shuns 
their eye; he fears they will upbraid God. What should 


244 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


they do? It seems a great injustice. But see the facts nearly 
and these mountainous inequalities vanish. Love reduces 
them as the sun melts the iceberg in the sea. The heart 
and soul of all men being one, this bitterness of His and Mine 
ceases. His is mine. I am my brother and my brother is me. 
If I feel overshadowed and outdone by great neighbors, I can 
yet love; I can still receive; and he that loveth maketh his 
own the grandeur he loves. Thereby I make the discovery 
that my brother is my guardian, acting for me with the 
friendliest designs, and the estate I so admired and envied is 
my own. It is the nature of the soul to appropriate all things. 
Jesus and Shakespeare are fragments of the soul, and by love 
I conquer and incorporate them in my own conscious domain. 
His virtue, — is not that mine? His wit, — if it cannot be 
made mine, it is not wit. 

Such also is the natural history of calamity. The changes 
which break up at short intervals the prosperity of men are 
advertisements of a nature whose law is growth. Every soul 
is by this intrinsic necessity quitting its whole system of things, 
its friends and home and laws and faith, as the shellfish crawls 
out of its beautiful but stony case, because it no longer admits 
of its growth, and slowly forms a new house. In proportion 
to the vigor of the individual these revolutions are frequent, 
until in some happier mind they are incessant and all worldly 
relations hang very loosely about him, becoming as it were a 
transparent fluid membrane through which the living form is 
seen, and not, as in most men, an indurated heterogeneous 
fabric of many dates and of no settled character, in which the 
man is imprisoned. Then there can be enlargement, and the 
man of to-day scarcely recognizes the man of yesterday. And 
such should be the outward biography of man in time, a 
putting off of dead circumstances day by day, as he renews his 
raiment day by day. But to us, in our lapsed estate, resting, 
not advancing, resisting, not cooperating with the divine 
expansion, this growth comes by shocks. 


COMPENSATION 


245 


We cannot part with our friends. We cannot let our angels 
go. We do not see that they only go out that archangels may 
come in. We are idolators of the old. We do not believe in 
the riches of the soul, in its proper eternity and omnipresence. 
We do not believe there is any force in to-day to rival or re¬ 
create that beautiful yesterday. We linger in the ruins of the 
old tent where once we had bread and shelter and organs, nor 
believe that the spirit can feed, cover, and nerve us again. 
We cannot again find aught so dear, so sweet, so graceful. 
But we sit and weep in vain. The voice of the Almighty saith, 
1 Up and onward forevermore! ’ We cannot stay amid the ruins. 
Neither will we rely on the new; and so we walk ever with 
reverted eyes, like those monsters who look backwards. 

And yet the compensations of calamity are made apparent 
to the understanding also, after long intervals of time. A 
fever, a mutilation, a cruel disappointment, a loss of wealth, 
a loss of friends, seems at the moment unpaid loss, and un¬ 
payable. But the sure years reveal the deep remedial force 
that underlies all facts. The death of a dear friend, wife, 
brother, lover, which seemed nothing but privation, some¬ 
what later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius; for it 
commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates 
an epoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be 
closed, breaks up a wonted occupation or a household or 
style of living, and allows the formation of new ones more 
friendly to the growth of character. It permits or constrains 
the formation of new acquaintances and the reception of new 
influences that prove of the first importance to the next years; 
and the man or woman who would have remained a sunny 
garden-flower, with no room for its roots and too much sun¬ 
shine for its head, by the falling of the walls and the neglect 
of the gardener is made the banian of the forest, yielding 
shade and fruit to wide neighborhoods of men. 


246 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


NOTES 

1 Emerson is here bringing out the truth so well recognized by 
all orators, evangelists, and playwrights, that audience psychology 
is on a different plane from the individual. This is responsible for 
the different technics in literature to be spoken and literature to 
be read; as the drama and the novel. 

2 The following chapter is the essay on Spiritual Laws. 

3 For a scientific definition, see a good dictionary. Emerson 
uses the word merely in its popular sense of opposite qualities. 

4 Of the heart. The contraction and expansion of the heart 
respectively, in its process of the circulation of the body, is kept 
up. 

5 Primary education in early days of the American system was 
in the hands mostly of elderly ladies. These schools were called 
“dames’ schools.” 

6 Cf. Luke XIV, 26. 

7 The Latin for the preceding sentence. 

8 A reference, of course, to the scientist’s faith in evolution. 

9 This expresses Emerson’s essential belief in Pantheism; that 
is, that all nature is an expression of God. The Unitarians still 
lay much stress upon Nature in their sermons. 

10 A quotation from the Greek poet Sophocles. 

11 This is dangerously close to a joke, though Emerson is not 
much given to humor. The loading of dice is a dishonest way of 
winning the game by so weighting the die that it tends to fall 
with the large numbers up. 

12 Emerson seems to be using this word here more in the sense 
of “sensuous” than “sensual,” which today probably has a lower 
meaning than in the early nineteenth century. 

13 Meaning to carry on a contest between buyer and seller in 
the establishment of a price. This was a common practice among 
merchants before the one-price practice prevailed. 

14 Cf. Horace, Epistles , I, 10. 

15 Here used in the lower sense. 

16 Cf. St. Augustine’s Confessions, Book I. Also, Isaiah, 
XXXIII, 5. 

17 According to Greek mythology, the founder of civilization. 
Hesiod tells how, in a controversy between gods and men, Prome¬ 
theus deceived Zeus, who in revenge withdrew fire from men. 
Prometheus stole it and carried it to earth, for which crime he was 
punished by being chained to a rock where every day an eagle 
preyed upon his liver. 

18 In Roman mythology she was supposed to be the daughter 
of Jupiter and the goddess of invention, thought, and intelligence. 

19 From Aeschylus’ Eumenides, 827-828, Sedgwick ed., we are 
told by Dr. J. P. Pritchard, Washington and Jefferson College. 


COMPENSATION 


247 

It is a part of Athena’s speech, nal K\fj8as ol8a Scoparos (Saiparoov?) 
liovq 6eu>v ev & Kepavvos eartv ea^paytcrpk.vos. 

20 Tithonus was a Trojan prince so beautiful that Aurora, 
goddess of the dawn, persuaded Jupiter to make him immortal, 
but forgot to ask to have him preserved as a young man. So he 
grew so old and ugly that Aurora had to change him into a grass¬ 
hopper. 

21 His mother, Thetis, dipped him in the River Styx to make 
him invulnerable, but neglected to dip his heel under. So he died 
later from a wound in his heel. 

22 The Nibelungenlied is a German epic of which the hero’s name 
is Siegfried. 

23 In Greek mythology the personification of retribution, the 
divinity of chastisement and vengeance. 

24 The Furies were Greek divinities: Tesiphone, Alecto, and 
Megsera. They were the ministers of the vengeance of the gods. 
See Gayley’s Classic Myths. 

25 Bravest of all the Greeks who besieged Troy except Achilles. 
He typifies brute strength and courage without reason. 

26 Son of Priam, king of Troy; leader of the Trojans; oppon¬ 
ent of Achilles. 

27 Hero on the Greek side in the Trojan War. 

28 Inhabitants»of the island of Thasos southeast of Thrace. 

29 A famous Greek athlete from Thasos in the Olympian games. 
He was supposed to have become a god after death. 

30 The greatest of the Greek sculptors (fifth century b.c.). 

31 Dante, Alighieri, Italian poet, writer of The Divine Comedy 
(1265-1321). 

32 A common expression. See Ben Jonson’s comedy, The 
Divell is an Asse, IV, 1. 

33 Burke, Edmund, Irish orator, statesman, and writer (1729- 

1797 )- 

34 Polycrates, emperor of Samos, was supposed to have been too 
fortunate for his own good. So under the advice of the king of 
Egypt, Amasis, he threw away his most prized possession, a ring, 
only to have it returned to him in the stomach of a fish sent him 
next day as a gift. This indicated that he was doomed, for the 
gods are always kind to those they intend to destroy. Sure 
enough, Polycrates was crucified by an enemy. 

36 From Wordsworth’s sonnet, Near Dover, September, 1802 , 
revised, 1807. 

36 One of iEsop’s fables. 

37 Old verb, now obsolete, meaning “benefit.” Horse traders 
in New England, when offering additional inducements to a bar¬ 
gain, called them “to boot”; that is, thrown in as gifts. 

38 Abbot of Clairvaux Monastery, a most gifted preacher, in¬ 
fluential in ending the so-called papal schism; i.e ., the claims of 
two popes (1091-1153). 


MANNERS 


T T ALF the world, it is said, knows not how the other half 
lives. Our Exploring Expedition saw the Feejee Island¬ 
ers getting their dinner off human bones; and they are said to 
eat their own wives and children. The husbandry of the 
modern inhabitants of Gournou (west of old Thebes) is 
philosophical to a fault. To set up their housekeeping, 
nothing is requisite but two or three earthen pots, a stone to 
grind meal, and a mat which is the bed. The house, namely, a 
tomb, is ready without rent or taxes. No rain can pass 
through the roof, and there is no door, for there is no want of 
one, as there is nothing to lose. If the house do not please 
them, they walk out and enter another, as there are several 
hundreds at their command. “It is somewhat singular,” 
adds Belzoni, 1 to whom we owe this account, “to talk of 
happiness among people who live in sepulchres, among the 
corpses and rags of an ancient nation which they know noth¬ 
ing of.” In the deserts of Borgoo, 2 the rock-Tibboos still 
dwell in caves, like cliff-swallows, and the language of these 
negroes is compared by their neighbors to the shrieking of 
bats and to the whistling of birds. Again, the Bornoos 3 have 
no proper names; individuals are called after their height, 
thickness, or other accidental quality, and have nicknames 
merely. But the salt, the dates, the ivory, and the gold, for 
which these horrible regions are visited, find their way into 
countries, where the purchaser and consumer can hardly be 
ranked in one race with these cannibals and man-stealers; 
countries where man serves himself with metals, wood, stone, 
glass, gum, cotton, silk, and wool; honors himself with archi¬ 
tecture ; writes laws, and contrives to execute his will through 
the hands of many nations; and, especially, establishes a 

248 


MANNERS 


M9 

select society, running through all the countries of intelligent 
men, a self-constituted aristocracy, or fraternity of the best, 
which, without written law or exact usage of any kind, per¬ 
petuates itself, colonizes every new-planted island, and adopts 
and makes its own whatever personal beauty or extraordi¬ 
nary native endowment anywhere appears. 

What fact more conspicuous in modern history, than the 
creation of the gentleman? Chivalry is that, and loyalty is 
that, and, in English literature, half the drama, and all the 
novels, from Sir Philip Sidney 4 to Sir Walter Scott, 6 paint this 
figure. The word gentleman, which, like the word Christian, 
must hereafter characterize the present and the few preceding 
centuries, by the importance attached to it, is a homage to 
personal and incommunicable properties. Frivolous and 
fantastic additions have got associated with the name, but the 
steady interest of mankind in it must be attributed to the 
valuable properites which it designates. An element which 
unites all the most forcible persons of every country; makes 
them intelligible and agreeable to each other, and is somewhat 
so precise, that it is at once felt if an individual lack the ma¬ 
sonic sign, — cannot be any casual product, but must be an 
average result of the character and faculties universally found 
in men. It seems a certain permanent average; as the at¬ 
mosphere is a permanent composition, whilst so many gases 
are combined only to be decompounded. Comme il faut, 6 is 
the Frenchman’s description of good society, as we must be. 
It is a spontaneous fruit of talents and feelings of precisely 
that class who have most vigor, who take the lead in the 
world of this hour, and, though far from pure, far from 
constituting the gladdest and highest tone of human feeling, 
is as good as the whole society permits it to be. It is made of 
the spirit, more than of the talent of men, and is a compound 
result, into which every great force enters as an ingredient; 
namely, virtue, wit, beauty, wealth, and power. 

There is something equivocal in all the words in use to 


250 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


express the excellence of manners and social cultivation, 
because the quantities are fluxional, and the last effect is 
assumed by the senses as the cause. The word gentleman 
has not any correlative abstract to express the quality. 
Gentility is mean, and gentilesse is obsolete. But we must 
keep alive in the vernacular the distinction between fashion , 
a word of narrow and often sinister meaning, and the heroic 
character which the gentleman imports. The usual words, 
however, must be respected; they will be found to contain 
the root of the matter. The point of distinction in all this 
class of names, as courtesy, chivalry, fashion, and the like, is, 
that the flower and fruit, not the grain of the tree, are con¬ 
templated. It is beauty which is the aim this time, and not 
worth. The result is now in question, although our words 
intimate well enough the popular feeling, that the appearance 
supposes a substance. The gentleman is a man of truth, lord 
of his own actions, and expressing that lordship in his be¬ 
havior, not in any manner dependent and servile either on 
persons, or opinions, or possessions. Beyond this fact of 
truth and real force, the word denotes good-nature or benevo¬ 
lence; manhood first, and then gentleness. The popular 
notion certainly adds a condition of ease and fortune; but that 
is a natural result of personal force and love, that they should 
possess and dispense the goods of the world. In times of 
violence, every eminent person must fall in with many oppor¬ 
tunities to approve his stoutness and worth; therefore every 
man’s name that emerged at all from the mass in the feudal 
ages, rattles in our ear like a flourish of trumpets. But per¬ 
sonal force never goes out of fashion. Tha't is still paramount 
to-day, and in the moving crowd of good society the men of 
valor and reality are known, and rise to their natural place. 
The competition is transferred from war to politics and 
trade, but the personal force appears readily enough in these 
new arenas. 

Power first, or no leading class. In politics and in trade, 


MANNERS 


251 


bruisers and pirates are of better promise than talkers and 
clerks. God knows that all sorts of gentlemen knock at the 
door; but whenever used in strictness and with any emphasis, 
the name will be found to point at original energy. It de¬ 
scribes a man standing in his own right and working after 
untaught methods. In a good lord there must first be a good 
animal, at least to the extent of yielding the incomparable 
advantage of animal spirits. The ruling class must have more, 
but they must have these, giving in every company the sense 
of power, which makes things easy to be done which daunt 
the wise. The society of the energetic class, in their friendly 
and festive meetings, is full of courage and of attempts, which 
intimidate the pale scholar. The courage which girls exhibit is 
like a battle of Lundy’s Lane, 8 or a sea fight. The intellect 
relies on memory to make some supplies to face these extem¬ 
poraneous squadrons. But memory is a base mendicant with 
basket and badge, in the presence of these sudden masters. 
The rulers of society must be up to the work of the world, and 
equal to their versatile office: men of the right Caesarian 
pattern, 9 who have great range of affinity. I am far from 
believing the timid maxim of Lord Falkland 10 (“that for 
ceremony there must go two to it; since a bold fellow will go 
through the cunningest forms”), and am of opinion that the 
gentleman is the bold fellow whose forms are not to be broken 
through; and only that plenteous nature is rightful master 
which is the complement of whatever person it converses with. 
My gentleman gives the law where he is; he will outpray saints 
in chapel, outgeneral veterans in the field, and outshine all 
courtesy in the hall. He is good company for pirates and good 
with academicians; so that it is useless to fortify yourself 
against him; he has the private entrance to all minds, and I 
could as easily exclude myself, as him. The famous gentlemen 
of Asia and Europe have been of this strong type; Saladin, 11 
Sapor, 12 the Cid, 13 Julius Caesar, 14 Scipio, 16 Alexander, 16 Peri¬ 
cles, 17 and the lordliest personages. They sat very carelessly 


252 


EMERSON'S ESSAYS 


in their chairs, and were too excellent themselves to value any 
condition at a high rate. 

A plentiful fortune is reckoned necessary, in the popular 
judgment, to the completion of this man of the world; and 
it is a material deputy which walks through the dance which 
the first has led. Money is not essential, but this wide affinity 
is, which transcends the habits of clique and caste and makes 
itself felt by men of all classes. If the aristocrat is only valid 
in fashionable circles, and not with truckmen, he will never 
be a leader in fashion; and if the man of the people cannot 
speak on equal terms with the gentleman, so that the gentle¬ 
man shall perceive that he is already really of his own order, 
he is not to be feared. Diogenes, 18 Socrates, 19 and Epaminon- 
das, 20 are gentlemen of the best blood who have chosen the 
condition of poverty when that of wealth was equally open to 
them. I use these old names, but the men I speak of are my 
contemporaries. Fortune will not supply to every generation 
one of these well-appointed knights, but every collection of 
men furnishes some example of the class; and the politics of 
this country, and the trade of every town, are controlled by 
these hardy and irresponsible doers, who have invention to 
take the lead, and a broad sympathy which puts them in 
fellowship with crowds, and makes their action popular. 

The manners of this class are observed and caught with 
devotion by men of taste. The association of these masters 
with each other and with men intelligent of their merits, is 
mutually agreeable and stimulating. The good forms, the 
happiest expressions of each, are repeated and adopted. 
By swift consent everything superfluous is dropped, every¬ 
thing graceful is renewed. Fine manners show themselves 
formidable to the uncultivated man. They are a subtler 
science of defence to parry and intimidate; but once matched 
by the skill of the other party, they drop the point of the 
sword, — points and fences disappear, and the youth finds 
himself in a more transparent atmosphere, wherein life is a 


MANNERS 


253 


less troublesome game, and not a misunderstanding rises 
between the players. Manners aim to facilitate life, to get 
rid of impediments, and bring the man pure to energize. They 
aid our dealing and conversation as a railway aids travelling, 
by getting rid of all avoidable obstructions of the road, 
and leaving nothing to be conquered but pure space. These 
forms very soon become fixed, and a fine sense of propriety is 
cultivated with the more heed that it becomes a badge of 
social and civil distinction. Thus grows up Fashion, an 
equivocal semblance, the most puissant, the most fantastic 
and frivolous, the most feared and followed, and which morals 
and violence assault in vain. 

There exists a strict relation between the class of power, 
and the exclusive and polished circles. The last are always 
filled or filling from the first. The strong men usually give 
some allowance even to the petulances of fashion, for that 
affinity they find in it. Napoleon, child of the revolution, 
destroyer of the old noblesse, never ceased to court the Fau¬ 
bourg 21 St. Germain; doubtless with the feeling that fashion 
is a homage to men of his stamp. Fashion, though in a strange 
way, represents all manly virtue. It is virtue gone to seed: 
it is a kind of posthumous honor. It does not often caress the 
great, but the children of the great: it is a hall of the Past. It 
usually sets its face against the great of this hour. Great men 
are not commonly in its halls; they are absent in the field: 
they are working, not triumphing. Fashion is made up of 
their children; of those who through the value and virtue of 
somebody, have acquired lustre to their name, marks of 
distinction, means of cultivation and generosity, and in 
their physical organization a certain health and excellence 
which secures to them if not the highest power to work, yet 
high power to enjoy. The class of power, the working heroes, 
the Cortez, 22 the Nelson, 23 the Napoleon, see that this is the 
festivity and permanent celebration of such as they; that 
fashion is funded talent; is Mexico, Marengo, 24 and Trafal- 


254 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


gar 25 beaten out thin; that the brilliant names of fashion run 
back to just such busy names as their own, fifty or sixty years 
ago. They are the sowers, their sons shall be the reapers, and 
their sons, in the ordinary cour.se of things, must yield the 
possession of the harvest to new competitors with keener eyes 
and stronger frames. The city is recruited from the country. 
In the year 1805, it is said, every legitimate monarch in 
Europe was imbecile. The city would have died out, rotted, 
and exploded, long ago, but that it was reinforced from the 
fields. It is only country which came to town day before 
yesterday that is city and court to-day. 

Aristocracy and fashion are certain inevitable results. 
These mutual selections are indestructible. If they provoke 
anger in the least favored class, and the excluded majority 
revenge themselves on the excluding minority by the strong 
hand and kill them, at once a new class finds itself at the top, 
as certainly as cream rises in a bowl of milk: and if the people 
should destroy class after class, until two men only were left, 
one of these would be the leader and would be involuntarily 
served and copied by the other. You may keep this minority 
out of sight and out of mind, but it is tenacious of life, and is 
one of the estates of the realm. I am the more struck with 
this tenacity, when I see its work. It respects the adminis¬ 
tration of such unimportant matters, that we should not look 
for any durability in its rule. We sometimes meet men under 
some strong moral influence, as a patriotic, a literary, a 
religious movement, and feel that the moral sentiment rules 
man and nature. We think all other distinctions and ties 
will be slight and fugitive, this of caste or fashion for example; 
yet come from year to year and see how permanent that is, in 
this Boston or New York life of man, where too it has not the 
least countenance from the law of the land. Not in Egypt or 
in India a firmer or more impassable line. Here are associ¬ 
ations whose ties go over and under and through it, a meeting 
of merchants, a military corps, a college class, a fire-club, a 


MANNERS 


255 


professional association, a political, a religious convention; — 
the persons seem to draw inseparably near; yet, that assembly 
once dispersed, its members will not in the year meet again. 
Each returns to his degree in the scale of good society, porce¬ 
lain remains porcelain, and earthen earthen. The objects of 
fashion may be frivolous, or fashion may be objectless, but 
the nature of this union and selection can be neither frivolous 
nor accidental. Each man’s rank in that perfect graduation 
depends on some symmetry in his structure, or some agree¬ 
ment in his structure to the symmetry of society. Its doors 
unbar instantaneously to a natural claim of their own kind. 
A natural gentleman finds his way in, and will keep the oldest 
patrician out who has lost his intrinsic rank. Fashion under¬ 
stands itself; good breeding and personal superiority of 
whatever country readily fraternize with those of every other. 
The chiefs of savage tribes have distinguished themselves in 
London and Paris by the purity of their tournure. 26 

To say what good of fashion we can, it rests on reality, and 
hates nothing so much as pretenders; to exclude and mystify 
pretenders, and send them into everlasting “Coventry,” 27 is 
its delight. We contemn, in turn, every other gift of men 
of the world; but the habit even in little and the least matters 
of not appealing to any but our own sense of propriety, con¬ 
stitutes the foundation of all chivalry. There is almost no 
kind of self-reliance, so it be sane and proportioned, which 
fashion does not occasionally adopt and give it the freedom of 
its saloons. A sainted soul is always elegant, and, if it will, 
passes unchallenged into the most guarded ring. But so will 
Jock the teamster pass, in some crisis that brings him thither, 
and find favor, as long as his head is not giddy with the new 
circumstance, and the iron shoes do not wish to dance in 
waltzes and cotillons. For there is nothing settled in man¬ 
ners, but the laws of behavior yield to the energy of the 
individual. The maiden at her first ball, the countryman 
at a city dinner, believes that there is a ritual according to 


256 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


which every act and compliment must be performed, or the 
failing party must be cast out of this presence. Later they 
learn that good sense and character make their own forms 
every moment, and speak or abstain, take wine or refuse it, 
stay or go, sit in a chair or sprawl with children on the floor, 
or stand on their head, or what else soever, in a new and 
aboriginal way; and that strong will is always in fashion, let 
who will be unfashionable. All that fashion demands is 
composure, and self-content. A circle of men perfectly well- 
bred would be a company of sensible persons in which every 
man’s native manners and character appeared. If the 
fashionist have not this quality, he is nothing. We are such 
lovers of self-reliance that we excuse in a man many sins if he 
will show us a complete satisfaction in his position, which asks 
no leave to be, of mine, or any man’s good opinion. But any 
deference to some eminent man or woman of the world, forfeits 
all privilege of nobility. He is an underling: I have nothing 
to do with him; I will speak with his master. A man should 
not go where he cannot carry his whole sphere or society with 
him, — not bodily, the whole circle of his friends, but atmos¬ 
pherically. He should preserve in a new company the same 
attitude of mind and reality of relation which his daily asso¬ 
ciates draw him to, else he is shorn of his best beams, and will 
be an orphan in the merriest club. “ If you could see Vich Ian 
Vohr with his tail on!-” But Vich Ian Vohr 28 must al¬ 

ways carry his belongings in some fashion, if not added as 
honor, then severed as disgrace. 

There will always be in society certain persons who are 
mercuries of its approbation, and whose glance will at any 
time determine for the curious their standing in the world. 
These are the chamberlains of the lesser gods. Accept their 
coldness as an omen of grace with the loftier deities, and al¬ 
low them all their privilege. They are clear in their office, nor 
could they be thus formidable without their own merits. But 
do not measure the importance of this class by their pre- 


MANNERS 


257 


tension, or imagine that a fop can be the dispenser of honor 
and shame. They pass also at their just rate; for how can 
they otherwise, in circles which exist as a sort of herald’s 
office for the sifting of character? 

As the first thing man requires of man is reality, so that 
appears in all the forms of society. We pointedly, and by 
name, introduce the parties to each other. Know you before 
all heaven and earth, that this is Andrew, and this is Gregory, 
— they look each other in the eye; they grasp each other’s 
hand, to identify and signalize each other. It is a great 
satisfaction. A gentleman never dodges; his eyes look 
straight forward, and he assures the other party, first of all, 
that he has been met. For what is it that we seek, in so many 
visits and hospitalities? Is it your draperies, pictures, and 
decorations? Or do we not insatiably ask, "Was a man in 
the house?” I may easily go into a great household where 
there is much substance, excellent provision for comfort, lux¬ 
ury, and taste, and yet not encounter there any Amphitryon, 29 
who shall subordinate these appendages. I may go into a 
cottage, and find a farmer who feels that he is the man I have 
come to see, and fronts me accordingly. It was therefore a 
very natural point of old feudal etiquette that a gentleman 
who received a visit, though it were of his sovereign, should 
hot leave his roof, but should wait his arrival at the door of 
his house. No house, though it were the Tuileries, 30 or the 
Escurial, 31 is good for anything without a master. And yet 
we are not often gratified by this hospitality. Every body we 
know surrounds himself with a fine house, fine books, con¬ 
servatory, gardens, equipage, and all manner of toys, as 
screens to interpose between himself and his guest. Does it 
not seem as if man was of a very sly, elusive nature, and 
dreaded nothing so much as a full rencontre front to front with 
his fellow? It were unmerciful, I know, quite to abolish the 
use of these screens, which are of eminent convenience, 
whether the guest is too great or too little. We call together 


i 


258 EMERSON’S ESSAYS 

many friends who keep each other in play, or by luxuries and 
ornaments we amuse the young people, and guard our retire¬ 
ment. Or if perchance a searching realist comes to our gate, 
before whose eye we have no care to stand, then again we run 
to our curtain, and hide ourselves as Adam at the voice of the 
Lord God in the garden. Cardinal Caprara, 32 the Pope’s 
legate at Paris, defended himself from the glances of Na¬ 
poleon by an immense pair of green spectacles. Napoleon 
remarked them, and speedily managed to rally them off: and 
yet Napoleon, in his turn, was not great enough with eight 
hundred thousand troops at his back, to face a pair of freeborn 
eyes, but fenced himself with etiquette and within triple 
barriers of reserve; and, as all the world knows from Madame 
de Stael, 33 was wont, when he found himself observed, to 
discharge his face of all expression. But emperors and rich 
men are by no means the most skilful masters of good man¬ 
ners. No rent-roll nor army-list can dignify skulking and 
dissimulation; and the first point of courtesy must always be 
truth, as really all the forms of good breeding point that way. 

I have just been reading, in Mr. Hazlitt’s 34 translation, 
Montaigne’s account of his journey into Italy, and am struck 
with nothing more agreeably than the self-respecting fashions 
of the time. His arrival in each place, the arrival of a gentle¬ 
man of France, is an event of some consequence. Wherever he* 
goes he pays a visit to whatever prince or gentleman of note 
resides upon his road, as a duty to himself and to civilization. 
When he leaves any house in which he has lodged for a few 
weeks, he causes his arms to be painted and hung up as a 
perpetual sign to the house, as was the custom of gentlemen. 

The complement of this graceful self-respect, and that of 
all the points of good breeding I most require and insist upon, 
is deference. I like that every chair should be a throne, and 
hold a king. I prefer a tendency to stateliness, to an excess of 
fellowship. Let the incommunicable objects of nature and 
the metaphysical isolation of man teach us independence. 


MANNERS 


259 


Let us not be too much acquainted. I would have a man 
enter his house through a hall filled with heroic and sacred 
sculptures, that he might not want the hint of tranquillity 
and self-poise. We should meet each morning as from foreign 
countries, and, spending the day together, should depart at 
night, as into foreign countries. In all things I would have 
the island of a man inviolate. Let us sit apart as the gods, 
talking from peak to peak all round Olympus. No degree of 
affection need invade this religion. This is myrrh and rose¬ 
mary to keep the other sweet. Lovers should guard their 
strangeness. If they forgive too much, all slides into con¬ 
fusion and meanness. It is easy to push this deference to a 
Chinese etiquette; but coolness and absence of heat and haste 
indicate fine qualities. A gentleman makes no noise; a lady 
is serene. Proportionate is our disgust at those invaders who 
fill a studious house with blast and running, to secure some 
paltry convenience. Not less I dislike a low sympathy of each 
with his neighbor’s needs. Must we have a good understand¬ 
ing with one another’s palates? as foolish people who have 
lived long together know when each wants salt or sugar. 
I pray my companion, if he wishes for bread, to ask me for 
bread, and if he wishes for sassafras or arsenic, to ask me for 
them, and not to hold out his plate as if I knew already. 
Every natural function can be dignified by deliberation and 
privacy. Let us leave hurry to slaves. The compliments and 
ceremonies of our breeding should recall, however remotely, 
the grandeur of our destiny. 

The flower of courtesy does not very well bide handling, 
but if we dare to open another leaf, and explore what parts go 
to its conformation, we shall find also an intellectual quality. 
To the leaders of men, the brain as well as the flesh and the 
heart must furnish a proportion. Defect in manners is usually 
the defect of fine perceptions. Men are too coarsely made for 
the delicacy of beautiful carriage and customs. It is not quite 
sufficient to good breeding, a union of kindness and inde- 


260 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


pendence. We imperatively require a perception of, and a 
homage to beauty in our companions. Other virtues are in 
request in the field and workyard, but a certain degree of taste 
is not to be spared in those we sit with. I could better eat with 
one who did not respect the truth or the laws than with a 
sloven and unpresentable person. Moral qualities rule the 
world, but at short distances the senses are despotic. The 
same discrimination of fit and fair runs out, if with less rigor, 
into all parts of life. The average spirit of the energetic class 
is good sense, acting under certain limitations and to certain 
ends. It entertains every natural gift. Social in its nature, it 
respects everything which tends to unite men. It delights in 
measure. The love of beauty is mainly the love of measure 
or proportion. The person who screams, or uses the superla¬ 
tive degree, or converses with heat, puts whole drawing-rooms 
to flight. If you wish to be loved, love measure. You must 
have genius or a prodigious usefulness, if you will hide the 
want of measure. This perception comes in to polish and 
perfect the parts of the social instruments. Society will 
pardon much to genius and special gifts, but, being in its 
nature a convention, it loves what is conventional, or what 
belongs to coming together. That makes the good and bad of 
manners; namely, what helps or hinders fellowship. For 
fashion is not good sense absolute, but relative; not good 
sense private, but good sense entertaining company. It hates 
corners and sharp points of character, hates quarrelsome, 
egotistical, solitary, and gloomy people; hates whatever can 
interfere with total blending of parties; whilst it values all 
peculiarities as in the highest degree refreshing, which can 
consist with good fellowship. And besides the general infusion 
of wit to heighten civility, the direct splendor of intellectual 
power is ever welcome in fine society as the costliest addition 
to its rule and its credit. 

The dry light must shine in to adorn our festival, but it must 
be tempered and shaded, or that will also offend. Accuracy 


MANNERS 


261 


is essential to beauty, and quick perceptions to politeness, but 
not too quick perceptions. One may be too punctual and too 
precise. He must leave the omniscience of business at the 
door, when he comes into the palace of beauty. Society loves 
creole natures, and sleepy, languishing manners, so that they 
cover sense, grace, and good-will: the air of drowsy strength, 
which disarms criticism; perhaps because such a person seems 
to reserve himself for the best of the game, and not spend 
himself on surfaces; an ignoring eye, which does not see the 
annoyances, shifts, and inconveniences that cloud the brow 
and smother the voice of the sensitve. 

Therefore besides personal force and so much perception as 
constitutes unerring taste, society demands in its patrician 
class another element already intimated, which it significantly 
terms good-nature, — expressing all degrees of generosity, from 
the lowest willingness and faculty to oblige, up to the heights 
of magnanimity and love. Insight we must have, or we shall 
run against one another and miss the way to our food; but 
intellect is selfish and barren. The secret of success in society 
is a certain heartiness and sympathy. A man who is not 
happy in the company cannot find any word in his memory 
that will fit the occasion. All his information is a little im¬ 
pertinent. A man who is happy there, finds in every turn of 
the conversation equally lucky occasions for the introduction 
of that which he has to say. The favorites of society and 
what it calls whole souls , are able men and of more spirit than 
wit, who have no uncomfortable egotism, but who exactly 
fill the hour and the company; contented and contenting, at 
a marriage or a funeral, a ball or a jury, a water-party or a 
shooting-match. England, which is rich in gentlemen, fur¬ 
nished, in the beginning of the present century, a good model 
of that genius which the world loves, in Mr. Fox, who 
added to his great abilities the most social disposition and 
real love of men. Parliamentary history has few better 
passages than the debate in which Burke 35 and Fox 36 separ- 


262 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


rated in the House of Commons; when Fox urged on his old 
friend the claims of old friendship with such tenderness that 
the house was moved to tears. Another anecdote is so close 
to my matter, that I must hazard the story. A tradesman 
who had long dunned him for a note of three hundred guineas, 
found him one day counting gold, and demanded payment: 
— “No,” said Fox, “I owe this money to Sheridan; 37 it is a 
debt of honor; if an accident should happen to me, he has 
nothing to show.” “Then,” said the creditor, “I change my 
debt into a debt of honor,” and tore the note in pieces. Fox 
thanked the man for his confidence and paid him, saying, 
“His debt was of older standing, and Sheridan must wait.” 
Lover of Liberty, friend of the Hindoo, friend of the African 
slave, he possessed a great personal popularity; and Napoleon 
said of him on the occasion of his visit to Paris, in 1805, 
“Mr. Fox will always hold the first place in an assembly at 
the Tuileries.” 

We may easily seem ridiculous in our eulogy of courtesy, 
whenever we insist on benevolence as its foundation. The 
painted phantasm Fashion rises to cast a species of derision 
on what we say. But I will neither be driven from some 
allowance to Fashion as a symbolic institution, nor from the 
belief that love is the basis of courtesy. We must obtain 
that , if we can; but by all means we must affirm this. Life 
owes much of its spirit to these sharp contrasts. Fashion, 
which affects to be honor, is often, in all men’s experience, 
only a ballroom code. Yet, so long as it is the highest circle 
in the imagination of the best heads on the planet, there is 
something necessary and excellent in it; for it is not to be 
supposed that men have agreed to be the dupes of anything 
preposterous; and the respect which these mysteries inspire 
in the most rude and sylvan characters, and the curiosity 
with which details of high life are read, betray the universality 
of the love of cultivated manners. I know that a comic dis¬ 
parity would be felt, if we should enter the acknowledged 


MANNERS 


263 

“first circles” and apply these terrific standards of justice, 
beauty, and benefit to the individuals actually found there. 
Monarchs and heroes, sages and lovers, these gallants are not. 
Fashion has many classes and many rules of probation and 
admission, and not the best alone. There is not only the right 
of conquest which genius pretends, — the individual demons¬ 
trating his natural aristocracy best of the best;—but less 
claims will pass for the time; for Fashion loves lions, and 
points like Circe 38 to her horned company. This gentleman 
is this afternoon arrived from Denmark; and that is my 
Lord Ride, who came yesterday from Bagdad; here is Captain 
Friese, from Cape Turnagain; and Captain Symmes, from 
the interior of the earth; and Monsieur Jovaire, who came 
down this morning in a balloon; Mr. Hobnail, the reformer; 
and Reverend Jul Bat, who has converted the whole torrid 
zone in his Sunday-school; and Signor Torre del Greco, who 
extinguished Vesuvius by pouring into it the Bay of Naples; 
Spahi, the Persian ambassador; and Tul Wil Shan, the exiled 
nabob of Nepaul, whose saddle is the new moon. — But these 
are monsters of one day, and to-morrow will be dismissed to 
their holes and dens; for in these rooms, every chair is waited 
for. The artist, the scholar, and, in general, the clerisy, win 
their way up into these places, and get represented here, 
somewhat on this footing of conquest. Another mode is to 
pass through all the degrees, spending a year and a day in 
St. Michael’s Square, being steeped in Cologne water, 39 and 
perfumed, and dined, and introduced, and properly grounded 
in all the biography and politics, and anecdotes of the bou¬ 
doirs. 

Yet these fineries may have grace and wit. Let there be 
grotesque sculpture about the gates # and offices of temples. 
Let the creed and commandments even have the saucy homage 
of parody. The forms of politeness universally express 
benevolence in superlative degrees. What if they are in the 
mouths of selfish men, and used as means of selfishness? 


264 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


What if the false gentleman almost bows the true out of the 
world? What if the false gentleman contrives so to address 
his companion as civilly to exclude all others from his dis¬ 
course, and also to make them feel excluded? Real service 
will not lose its nobleness. All generosity is not merely 
French and sentimental; nor is it to be concealed that living 
blood and a passion of kindness does at last distinguish God’s 
gentleman from Fashion’s. The epitaph of Sir Jenkin Grout 
is not wholly unintelligible to the present age. “Here lies 
Sir Jenkin Grout, who loved his friend and persuaded his 
enemy: what his mouth ate, his hand paid for: what his 
servants robbed, he restored: if a woman gave him pleasure, 
he supported her in pain: he never forgot his children; and 
whoso touched his finger, drew after it his whole body.” 
Even the line of heroes is not utterly extinct. There is still 
ever some admirable person in plain clothes, standing on the 
wharf, who jumps in to rescue a drowning man; there is still 
some absurd inventor of charities; some guide and comforter 
of runaway slaves; some friend of Poland; some Philhel- 
lene; 40 some fanatic who plants shade-trees for the second 
and third generation, and orchards when he is grown old; 
some well-concealed piety; some just man happy in an ill- 
fame; some youth ashamed of the favors of fortune and im¬ 
patiently casting them on other shoulders. And these are 
the centres of society, on which it returns for fresh impulses. 
These are the creators of Fashion, which is an attempt to or¬ 
ganize beauty of behavior. The beautiful and the generous 
are, in the theory, the doctors and apostles of this church: 
Scipio, and the Cid, and Sir Philip Sidney, and Washington, 
and every pure and valiant heart who worshipped Beauty by 
word and by deed. The persons who constitute the natural 
aristocracy are not found in the actual aristocracy, or only 
on its edge; as the chemical energy of the spectrum is found 
to be greatest just outside of the spectrum. Yet that is the 
infirmity of the seneschals, who do not know their sovereign 



MANNERS 


265 

when he appears. The theory of society supposes the exist¬ 
ence and sovereignty of these. It divines afar off their com¬ 
ing. It says with the elder gods, — 

“As Heaven and Earth are fairer far 41 
Than Chaos and blank Darkness, though once chiefs; 

And as we show beyond that Heaven and Earth, 

In form and shape compact and beautiful; 

So, on our heels a fresh perfection treads; 

A power, more strong in beauty, born of us, 

And fated to excel us, as we pass 
In glory that old Darkness: 

- for, ’t is the eternal law, 

That first in beauty shall be first in might.” 

Therefore, within the ethnical circle of good society there 
is a narrower and higher circle, concentration of its light, and 
flower of courtesy, to which there is always a tacit appeal 
of pride and reference, as to its inner and imperial court; the 
parliament of love and chivalry. And this is constituted of 
those persons in whom heroic dispositions are native, with the 
love of beauty, the delight in society, and the power to em¬ 
bellish the passing day. If the individuals who compose the 
purest circles of aristocracy in Europe, the guarded blood of 
centuries, should pass in review, in such manner as that we 
could, at leisure, and critically, inspect their behavior, we 
might find no gentleman and no lady; for although excellent 
specimens of courtesy and high breeding would gratify us in 
the assemblage, in the particulars we should detect offence. 
Because elegance comes of no breeding, but of birth. There 
must be romance of character, or the most fastidious ex¬ 
clusion of impertinencies will not avail. It must be genius 
which takes that direction: it must be not courteous, but 
courtesy. High behavior is as rare in fiction as it is in fact. 
Scott is praised for the fidelity with which he painted the 
demeanor and conversation of the superior classes. Certainly, 
kings and queens, nobles and great ladies, had some right to 



266 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


complain of the absurdity that had been put in their mouths 
before the days of Waverley; but neither does Scott’s dia¬ 
logue bear criticism. His lords brave each other in smart 
epigrammatic speeches, but the dialogue is in costume, and 
does not please on the second reading: it is not warm with life. 
In Shakspeare alone the speakers do not strut and bridle, 
the dialogue is easily great, and he adds to so many titles that 
of being the best-bred man in England and in Christendom. 
Once or twice in a lifetime we are permitted to enjoy the charm 
of noble manners, in the presence of a man or woman who 
have no bar in their nature, but whose character emanates 
freely in their word and gesture. A beautiful form is better 
than a beautiful face; a beautiful behavior is better than a 
beautiful form: it gives a higher pleasure than statues or 
pictures; it is the finest of the fine arts. A man is but a little 
thing in the midst of the objects of nature, yet, by the moral 
quality radiating from his countenance he may abolish all 
considerations of maghitude, and in his manners equal the 
majesty of the world. I have seen an individual whose man¬ 
ners, though wholly within the conventions of elegant society, 
were never learned there, but were original and commanding 
and held out protection and prosperity; one who did not 
need the aid of a court-suit, but carried the holiday in his 
eye; who exhilarated the fancy by flinging wide the doors of 
new modes of existence; who shook off the captivity of eti¬ 
quette, with happy, spirited bearing, good-natured and free 
as Robin Hood; 42 yet with the port of an emperor, if need 
be, — calm, serious, and fit to stand the gaze of millions. 

The open air and the fields, the street and public chambers 
are the places where Man executes his will; let him yield or 
divide the sceptre at the door of the house. Woman, with her 
instinct of behavior, instantly detects in man a love of trifles, 
any coldness or imbecility, or, in short, any want of that large, 
flowing, and magnanimous deportment which is indispensable 
as an exterior in the hall. Our American institutions have 


MANNERS 


267 


been friendly to her, and at this moment I esteem it a chief 
felicity of this country, that it excels in women. A certain 
awkward consciousness of inferiority in the men may give 
rise to the new chivalry in behalf of Women’s Rights. Cer¬ 
tainly let her be as much better placed in the laws and in 
social forms as the most zealous reformer can ask, but I 
confide so entirely in her inspiring and musical nature, that I 
believe only herself can show us how she shall be served. The 
wonderful generosity of her sentiments raises her at times into 
heroical and godlike regions, and verifies the pictures of 
Minerva, 43 Juno, 44 or Polymnia; 45 and by the firmness with 
which she treads her upward path, she convinces the coarsest 
calculators that another road exists than that which their feet 
know. But besides those who make good in our imagination 
the place of muses and of Delphic Sibyls, 46 are there not 
women who fill our vase with wine and roses to the brim, so 
that the wine runs over and fills the house with perfume; who 
inspire us with courtesy; who unloose our tongues and we 
speak; who anoint our eyes and we see? We say things we 
never thought to have said; for once, our walls of habitual 
reserve vanished and left us at large; we were children playing 
with children in a wide field of flowers. Steep us, we cried, 
in these influences, for days, for weeks, and we shall be sunny 
poets and will write out in many-colored words the romance 
that you are. Was it Hafiz 47 or Firdousi 48 that said of his 
Persian Lilia, “She was an elemental force, and astonished me 
by her amount of life, when I saw her day after day radiating, 
every instant, redundant joy and grace on all around her.” 
She was a solvent powerful to reconcile all heterogeneous 
persons into one society: like air or water, an element of 
such a great range of affinities that it combines readily with 
a thousand substances. Where she is present all others will 
be more than they are wont. She was a unit and whole, so 
that whatsoever she did, became her. She had too much 
sympathy and desire to please, than that you could say her 


268 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


manners were marked with dignity, yet no princess could 
surpass her clear and erect demeanor on each occasion. She 
did not study the Persian grammar, nor the books of the 
seven poets, but all the poems of the seven seemed to be 
written upon her. For though the bias of her nature was not 
to thought, but to sympathy, yet was she so perfect in her 
own nature as to meet intellectual persons by the fulness of her 
heart, warming them by her sentiments; believing, as she did, 
that by dealing nobly with all, all would show themselves 
noble. 

I know that this Byzantine 49 pile of chivalry or Fashion, 
which seems so fair and picturesque to those who look at the 
contemporary facts for science or for entertainment, is not 
equally pleasant to all spectators. The constitution of our 
society makes it a giant’s castle to the ambitious youth who 
have not found their names enrolled in its Golden Book, 50 and 
whom it has excluded from its coveted honors and privileges. 
They have yet to learn that its seeming grandeur is shadowy 
and relative: it is great by their allowance; its proudest gates 
will fly open at the approach of their courage and virtue. For 
the present distress, however, of those who are predisposed 
to suffer from the tyrannies of this caprice, there are easy 
remedies. To remove your residence a couple of miles, or at 
most four, will commonly relieve the most extreme suscepti¬ 
bility. For the advantages which fashion values are plants 
which thrive in very confined localities, in a few streets 
namely. Out of this precinct they go for nothing; are of no 
use in the farm, in the forest, in the market, in war, in the 
nuptial society, in the literary or scientific circle, at sea, in 
friendship, in the heaven of thought or virtue. 

But we have lingered long enough in these painted courts. 
The worth of the thing signified must vindicate our taste for 
the emblem. Everything that is called fashion and courtesy 
humbles itself before the cause and fountain of honor, creator 


MANNERS 


269 


of titles and dignities; namely, the heart of love. This is the 
royal blood, this is the fire, which, in all countries and con¬ 
tingencies, will work after its kind and conquer and expand 
all that approaches it. This gives new meanings to every fact. 
This impoverishes the rich, suffering no grandeur but ito own. 
What is rich? Are you rich enough to help anybody? to succor 
the unfashionable and the eccentric? rich enough to make the 
Canadian in his wagon, the itinerant with his consul’s paper 
which commends him “To the charitable,” the swarthy 
Italian with his few broken words of English, the lame pauper 
hunted by overseers from town to town, even the poor insane 
or besotted wreck of man or woman, feel the noble exception 
of your presence and your house, from the general bleakness 
and stoniness; to make such feel that they were greeted with 
a voice which made them both remember and hope? What is 
vulgar but to refuse the claim on acute and conclusive reasons? 
What is gentle, but to allow it, and give their heart and yours 
one holiday from the national caution? Without the rich 
heart, wealth is an ugly beggar. The king of Schiraz 51 could 
not afford to be so bountiful as the poor Osman who dwelt at 
his gate. Osman had a humanity so broad and deep that 
although his speech was so bold and free with the Koran as to 
disgust all the dervishes, yet was there never a poor outcast, 
eccentric, or insane man, some fool who had cut off his beard, 
or who had been mutilated under a vow, or had a pet mad¬ 
ness in his brain, but fled at once to him; that great heart lay 
there so sunny and hospitable in the centre of the country, that 
it seemed as if the instinct of all sufferers drew them to his side. 
And the madness which he harbored he did not share. Is not 
this to be rich? this only to be rightly rich? 

But I shall hear without pain, that I pay the courtier very 
ill, and talk of that which I do not well understand. It is 
easy to see that what is called by distinction society and 
fashion has good laws as well as bad, has much that is neces¬ 
sary, and much that is absurd. Too good for banning, and 


270 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


too bad for blessing, it reminds us of a tradition of the pagan 
mythology, in any attempt to settle its character. “I over¬ 
heard Jove , 52 one day,” said Silenus , 53 “talking of destroying 
the earth; he said it had failed; they were all rogues and 
vixens, who went from bad to worse as fast as the days suc¬ 
ceeded each other. Minerva said, she hoped not; they 
were only ridiculous little creatures, with this odd circum¬ 
stance, that they had a blur, or indeterminate aspect,- ceen far 
or seen near; if you called them bad, they would appear so; 
if you called them good, they would appear so; and there was 
no one person or action among them which would not puzzle 
her owl, much more all Olympus, to know whether it was 
fundamentally bad or good.” 


NOTES 

1 Belzoni, Giovanni Battista, Italian voyager who made ex¬ 
plorations in Egypt (1778-1822). 

2 Borgoo (Borgu ), a district of Dahomey, (French) and northern 
Nigeria (British) in west Africa. Rock-Tibboos (Tibbu or Tu ), a 
nomad tribe, mostly Negro, to be encountered west of the Sahara 
Desert. The proper name means “men of Tu,” and to call them 
Rock-Tibboos is like saying “rock-men of rocks.” 

3 Bornoos (Bornuese?), Negro inhabitants of Bornu, a country 
in central Sudan, south of the Sahara Desert. 

4 See page 147, note 48. 

5 Scotch poet and novelist (1771-1832). 

6 “As it should or must be.” 

7 Courtesy, good breeding. 

8 This took place July 25, 1814, in the province of Ontario, 
Canada, when the Americans defeated the British. 

9 Like J ulius Csesar. 

10 Lord Falkland , Lucius Cary, Viscount, English patriot, ad¬ 
herent of the royal party (ca. 1610-1643). 

11 Saladin (Salah-ed-din), Yusuf Ibn Ayub, sultan of Syria and 
Egypt; opposed the Crusaders at Acre (1137-1193). 

12 Name common to several Persian rulers. Sapor I (died 272), 
opposed Rome and captured the emperor Valerian, 260 a.d. 
Sapor II (died 381), called the Great, was famous for persecuting 
the Christians. 

13 See page 146, note 33. 

14 See page 23, note 58. 


MANNERS 


271 


15 See page 223, note 16. 

16 See page 61, note 112. 

17 See page 58, note 52. 

18 See page 224, note 72. 

19 See page 58, note 48. 

20 A statesman of Thebes who twice successfully opposed 
Sparta (ca. 418-362). 

21 In Paris. A section of the city outside the original walls, 
very aristocratic in atmosphere, containing a royal chateau, park, 
and museums; famous as a pleasure resort. 

* 22 Cortez , Hernando, a Spanish explorer who subdued Mexico 
and discovered California (1485-1547). 

hs 2 3 Nelson , Horatio, Viscount, English admiral, author of the 
famous slogan, “England expects every man to do his duty.” 

24 A town in Italy, the scene of the defeat of the Austrians by 
Napoleon, June 14, 1800. 

25 The battle of Trafalgar, where Lord Nelson defeated the 
Spaniards and French and where he lost his life, took place off 
Cape Trafalgar on the coast of Spain. 

26 The outline or contour of the human figure. 

27 A town in Warwickshire. To be “sent to Coventry” was 
equivalent to being ostracized. 

28 A character in Scott’s Waverley. 

29 A mythological character, the foster-father of Hercules. 

30 See page 171, note 21. 

31 A great palace, church, and monastery where the Spanish 
kings are buried. It is near Madrid and was built by Philip II 
in the sixteenth century. 

32 Cardinal Caprara, Giovanni Battista, an Italian cardinal who 
reestablished public worship in France in 1802 (1733-1810). 

33 A perfume first manufactured at Cologne. 

34 See Montaigne, note 27. 

35 See Compensation, note 33. 

36 See Napoleon, note 34. 

37 Sheridan, Richard Brinsley Butler, English dramatist and 
politician (1751-1816). 

38 In Greek mythology an enchantress who turned men into 
swine through a magic potion; a character in Homer’s Odyssey. . 

39 Name for perfume made of alcohol scented with aromatic 
oils manufactured at Cologne by Jean Farina in 1709. 

40 A lover of Greece and the Greeks. 

41 From Keats’ Hyperion. 

42 See page 146, note 35. 

43 Goddess of wisdom, war, and all the liberal arts. 

44 Sister and wife of the god Jupiter. 

46 One of the Muses, patroness of singing and rhetoric. 

46 The Delphic Sibyl was supposed to be an inspired woman 
connected with the oracle. 


272 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


47 The popular name of the Persian poet Shams ed-Din Mu¬ 
hammad (died ca. 1389). 

48 Nom de plume of Abul Casim Mansur, the greatest of the 
Persian epic poets {ca. 939-1020). 

49 Pertaining to ancient Byzantium, now Constantinople. 

60 An official record of the nobles under the Venetian republic. 

61 Evidently refers to some oriental legend. 

62 Jove, chief of the gods in Roman mythology. 

63 Silenus, the eldest of the satyrs. Bacchus, the god of wine, 
was his disciple. 


Appendix 

GENERAL QUESTIONS 

I. What Constitutes a Great Man? Among primitive peoples 
physical strength is a sufficient qualification. ( e.g . The heroes 
in epics like the Iliad, Nibelungenlied, Beowulf, etc.) Among 
civilized peoples there are various viewpoints: (i) The military 
standard. (2) The Christian-pacifist standard. (3) The business, 
big-money standard. (4) The scholarly, intellectual standard. 
(5) The athletic standard. 

1. Comment on each of these standards. 

2. Formulate a standard of greatness that agrees with Emer¬ 
son’s conception. 

3. In what respects was Emerson a great man? 

4. In what respects, in your judgment, did he fall short of per¬ 
fection? 

5. Among the seven types of Representative Men cited by 
Emerson what qualities have they in common? 

6. If you were selecting seven men to represent your ideas of 
greatness, whom would you choose? Would you agree with 
Emerson in the choice of any one type? 

II. Religion: What is a Puritan? Are there various types of 
Puritans? Are there any Puritans today? Where? What caused 
the English Puritans to form separate sects? Look up the English 
history of Puritanism and write a composition on: (1) The first 
English Puritans (The Lollards). (2) The Lollard Martyrs 
(during Henry VIIPs reign). (3) Puritanism during Shaks- 
peare’s time. (4) The Puritan Revolution. (5) Oliver Cromwell 
and his government. (6) The History of the Presbyterian 
Church. (7) The History of the Baptist Church. (8) The History 
of the Quakers. (9) The History of the Methodist Church. 
(10) The History of the Pilgrims from the time they left England 
to the time of the founding of the American colony. (11) The 
quarrel of Roger Williams with the Boston leaders and the found¬ 
ing of Rhode Island. (12) Early New England Literature. (13) 
What does a Unitarian believe? Give a history of the Unitarian 
Church. (14) What was Transcendentalism? What particular 
philosophies were taught by Kant, Fichte, Schelling, etc.? 

III. Biography: Emerson mentions the names of a great many 
mystics, philosophers, writers, scientists, etc., which he takes no 

273 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


274 

pains to identify. The footnotes will aid you in locating the 
nationality, age, and speciality of each of these men. Select some 
of these names that appeal most to you. Look up the more inti¬ 
mate details of their biographies, and write biographical essays 
about them. 

IV. History: Study the English and American backgrounds of 
Puritanism, and write essays on topics similar to the following: 

1. What act of Charles I caused the great Revolution of 1649? 

2. What was the attitude of Charles II toward religion? 

3. What acts or decrees led either to the persecution of Dis¬ 
senters or to forcing them to join the American colonists? 

4. What was James II’s attitude toward Dissenters? 

5. In what ways did the Massachusetts Colony prove herself 
self-reliant, independent, and individual long before the Revolu¬ 
tion of 1776? 


QUESTIONS 


Uses of Great Men 

1. Do you agree with the statement that “Nature seems to 
exist for the excellent’’? Explain. 

2. What is Emerson’s idea of a great man? 

3. “The true artist has the planet for his pedestal; the ad¬ 
venturer, after years of strife, has nothing broader than his own 
shoes.’’ What does Emerson mean? 

4. What does Emerson say about man’s relation to nature 
and the universe? 

5. Write short compositions using the following as topic 
sentences: 

(1) Thus we sit by the fire and take hold of the poles of the 

earth. 

(2) Every ship that comes to America got its chart from 
Columbus. 

(3) Activity is contagious. 

(4) Men are helpful through the intellect and the affec¬ 
tions. 

6. How does Emerson “illustrate the distinctive benefit of 
ideas’’? 

7. Explain: “Nature never spares the opium or nepenthe, 
but wherever she mars her creatures with some deformity or 
defect, lays her poppies plentifully on the bruise, etc.” 

8. What danger can there be in the influence of a great man? 

9. Comment: “ Men who know the same things are not long 
the best company for each other.” 

10. What is the prospect for great men tQ come in the future? 


APPENDIX 


275 


Plato 

1. What does Emerson say about Plato's “range"? 

2. What indebtedness does Plato show to his contemporaries 
and to preceding writers? 

3. What does Emerson mean by saying that Plato’s biog¬ 
raphy is “interior"? 

4. What comparison does Emerson make between an imma¬ 
ture person and the history of Europe? 

5. How does Emerson define philosophy? 

6. What idea brings the religious writers of East and West to¬ 
gether? 

7. Explain how Plato is a “balanced soul.” 

8. What does Emerson mean by the statement: “Every 
great artist has been such by synthesis"? 

9. What qualities which Emerson praises in Plato do you 
think are true of his own nature? 

10. What was Plato’s conception of culture? 

11. Describe Plato’s material circumstances and characteris¬ 
tics. 

12. Explain the statement: “He has clapped copyright on the 
world." 

13. (New Readings.) What new ideas does Emerson add? 

14. Explain why he calls Plato “this eldest Goethe.” 

Swedenborg 

1. What do you understand by a “mystic"? Do you think 
Emerson has (judging either by what he tells us of Swedenborg or 
what you learn from other sources) rightly taken Swedenborg as a 
typical mystic? 

2. Discuss Swedenborg’s life as a scientist. 

3. Explain the statement: “Swedenborg was born into an 
atmosphere of great ideas." 

4. Under what headings did Swedenborg classify his ideas? 

5. What is Swedenborg’s attitude toward nature? 

6. What are Swedenborg’s ideas about marriage? 

7. In what respect did Emerson think Swedenborg and 
Behmen had failed? 

8. What is unique about Swedenborg’s Inferno (or Hell)? 

9. What is Swedenborg’s conception of Angels? 

10. Was Swedenborg a poet in any sense? 

11. In what way has Swedenborg rendered a double service to 
mankind? 


276 


EMERSON’S ESSAYS 


Montaigne 

1. Do you notice any change of style in this essay? If so, 
state in what particulars it may be detected. 

2. What qualities attributed to Montaigne constitute Emer¬ 
son’s definition of Scepticism? 

3. How did Emerson happen to discover Montaigne as a 
writer? 

4. What was Montaigne’s early profession? And how did he 
happen to leave it? At what age? 

5. Explain the statement: “Montaigne is the frankest and 
honestest of all writers.” 

6. What sort of subjects did Montaigne choose for his essays? 
Characterize his style. 

7. Emerson says, “We are natural believers.” Comment on 
this statement. 

8. What, according to Emerson, is belief? 

9. Why are great believers often reckoned infidels? 

10. What is Emerson’s final “solution in which scepticism is 
lost”? 

Shakspeare 

1. To what extent does Emerson think geniuses should be 
original? 

2. Look up the early history of the English stage previous to 
Shakspeare and write a description or an exposition of the 
material. (See Development of Shakspeare as a Dramatist , by 
G. P. Baker; The English Religious Drama , by Katherine Lee 
Bates; The Mediceval Stage by E. K. Chambers.) 

3. Write an account of Shakspeare’s youth at Stratford and 
London. (See Sidney Lee’s Life of Shakspeare .) 

4. Comment upon Emerson’s inaccuracy in his reference to 
Chaucer’s indebtedness to other writers. (See Lounsbury’s 
Chaucer .) 

5. Read the old English plays, Ferr ex and Porrex and Gammer 
Gurton's Needle, and write your impression of the age that en¬ 
joyed such plays. 

6. Explain what Emerson means by saying that “Shakspeare 
is the only biographer of Shakspeare.” 

7. Write an appreciation of Shakspeare as Emerson views 
him. 

8. Read some of Shakspeare’s less familiar plays. 

Napoleon 

1. What classes of society are there, according to Emerson, 
and where does he place Napoleon? 


APPENDIX 


277 


2. Why was Napoleon “the idol of common men’’? 

3. What was his attitude toward war? Toward social rank? 

4. How did Napoleon account for his own greatness? 

5. Resting your judgment on the anecdotes and quotations 
cited by Emerson, give your impressions of Napoleon as a man of 
action. As a general. 

6. What was Napoleon’s attitude toward religion? Toward 
medicine and health? Toward ladies? Toward politics? 

7. Do you think Emerson quite consistent in his final ap¬ 
praisement of Napoleon as compared with what he has said in 
the earlier part of the essay? 


Gcethe 

1. Explain the significance of the long introduction with 
respect to the subject of Gcethe. 

2. Explain how Goethe was “the soul of his century.’’ 

3. What did Gcethe do with the devil as a type? 

4. What did Novalis mean by designating Wilhelm Meister as 
“thoroughly modern and prosaic”? 

5. How differently do French and English readers regard 
Goethe? 

6. Why cannot Gcethe be “dear to men”? 

7. Why is Gcethe not an “artist”? (Note the sense in which 
the word artist is employed by Emerson.) 


Self-Reliance 

1. Discuss Emerson’s idea of genius as expounded in this 
essay. 

2. Explain what Emerson means when he says “God will not 
have his work made manifest by cowards.” 

3. Discuss Emerson’s conception of boy nature. 

4. Explain Emerson’s dictum that “whoso would be a man 
must be a non-conformist.” 

5. How does Emerson feel about the alleged virtue of con¬ 
sistency? 

6. Enlarge, with illustrations, on the statement that “an 
institution is the lengthened shadow of one man.” 

7. Explain Emerson’s theory of “intuition.” 

8. What does Emerson mean when he says “The centuries 
are conspirators against the sanity and authority of the soil ’ ’ ? 

9. What is the meaning of the statement “No man can 
come near me but through my act ” ? 

10. Discuss Emerson’s conception of prayer. 

11. What was Emerson’s attitude toward truth? 

12. What did Emerson believe about imitation? 


2 7 S EMERSON'S ESSAYS 

13. What does Emerson say about the effect of civilization on 
man? 

14. What was Emerson’s attitude toward property? 

15. Sum up the argument of the essay in a few words. 

Compensation 

1. What did Emerson think of the current theology of his 
time? 

2. Discuss briefly Emerson’s theory of dualism in the external 
world, in mechanic forces, and in man. 

3. How does the law of compensation operate in political life? 

4. What does Emerson mean by his statement “The dice of 
God are always loaded’’? 

5. Explain the meaning of the statement, “There is a crack 
in everything God has made.” 

6. Discuss the moral element of the classic fables. 

7. What was Emerson’s dictum concerning popular proverbs? 

8. What was Emerson’s theory of punishment for “infrac¬ 
tions of love and equity”? 

9. Discuss Emerson’s attitude toward fear. 

10. Explain Emerson’s teaching about “paying the price.” 

11. What does Emerson mean when he says “Every evil to 
which we do not succumb is a benefactor”? 

12. What does Emerson mean by His admonition to “put God 
in your debt”? 

13. Discuss Emerson’s conception of the relation of love to the 
soul of man. 

14. What does Emerson believe with regard to the usages of 
calamity? 

Manners 

1. Tell briefly the conception Emerson had of a gentleman. 

2. What did Emerson believe to be the true attributes of the 
aristocrat? 

3. What did Emerson think was the true office of good 
manners? 

4. Explain how Emerson believed the cultivated classes are 
recruited from the common people. 

5. Explain Emerson’s idea of the relation of character to 
fashion. 

6. Elaborate the idea in Emerson’s dictum that “the first 
point of courtesy must always be the truth.” 

7. Give Emerson’s conception of the importance of good taste 
in society. 

8. What does Emerson mean in his use of the word “ measure ” 
as applied to social intercourse? 


APPENDIX 279 

9. Explain why Emerson stresses “good nature” as a neces¬ 
sary attribute of social success. 

10. What do you think of Emerson’s faint attempts at humor 
in this essay? 

11. Find Emerson’s definition of “fashion.” 

12. What is Emerson’s attitude toward woman as expressed in 
this essay? 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


Charles M. Andrews, The Fathers of New England, Vol. VI, 
Chronicles of America Series, 1921. 

Augustine Birrell, Obiter Dicta, 1891. 

Walter C. Bronson, A Short History of American Literature, 
1906. 

Cambridge History of American Literature, Vol. I, Chaps. Ill, IV, 
V, IX. 

George Willis Cooke, Unitarianism in America, 1902. 

George Willis Cooke, Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1881. 

M. D. Conway, Emerson At Home and Abroad, 1882. 

Samuel McChord Crothers, R. W. Emerson; How To Know 
Him, 1921. 

HenrV M. Dexter, The Congregationalism of the Last Three 
Hundred Years, as Seen in its Literature, 1880. 

John Fiske, The Beginning of New England, 1896. 

Har-old Clarke Goddard, Studies in New England Trans¬ 
cendentalism, 1908. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1885. 

Henry Jones, Partial Portraits, 1911. 

James Russell Lowell, “Emerson the Lecturer,” My Study 
Windows, 1899. 

Paul Elmer More, Influence of Emerson, Shelburne Essays, 
First Series, 1904, pp. 71-84. 

George Santayana, Emerson, Interpretations of Poetry and Re¬ 
ligion, 1900, pp. 217-233. 

W. B. Sprague, Annals of the American Pulpit, 1857. 

Lindsay Swift, Brook Farm, 1900. 

H. D. Traill, Social England, Vol. IV, 1897. 

M. C. Tyler, A History of American Literature During the 
Colonial Period, 1897. 

Williston Walker, A History of the Congregational Churches in 
the United States, 1900. 

Justin Winsor, Memorial History of Boston, 4 vols., 1880-1886. 

George E. Woodberry, Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1907. 

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